13:27 EDT - Big television channel owners should be prepared for carriage fee negotiations to become "much more challenging" as pay TV distributors consolidate, writes research firm MoffettNathanson. In the wake of news last week that deal-hungry Altice NV, a European telecom giant with big U.S. cable ambitions, is set to acquire Cablevision Systems, MoffettNathanson says 90% of the pay TV universe will be controlled by six distribution companies. That means that "gone are the days of picking on small and weak distributors" for media companies to ram through big carriage fee increases. The upshot is that smaller media companies like AMC Networks, Starz, Discovery Communications and Scripps Networks Interactive need to "figure out a way to get bigger" to better compete for their share of the affiliate fee pie. (shalini.ramachandran@wsj.com; @shaliniwsj)

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(END) Dow Jones Newswires

September 21, 2015 13:42 ET (17:42 GMT)

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