MUMBAI: The declination of Lions Gate Entertainment to submit a new bid indicates that the company seems to have dropped out of the bidding process for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). A public statement to this effect has however not been issued.

Neither has Time Warner nor another bidder, Access Industries, run by the billionaire Len Blavatnik has bid more than $1.5 billion. It is said that MGM asked its lenders on Wednesday for more time to reorganise its debts as it considered the takeover bids. But MGM‘s creditors are unlikely to be happy with any proposal under $2 billion. 

Lions Gate has come under pressure from Carl C. Icahn, an activist shareholder, to abandon any bid for MGM. Icahn, who already owns 18.9 per cent of Lions Gate, has however gone ahead and bid for the studio.

Both Lions Gate and Icahn have been engaged in a war of words last week after the former rejected his offer of $6 a share as inadequate.