Sportscope Television Network, parent company to Headline Sports-The Score, is set to acquire Old Canada Investment in a reverse takeover.

Under the agreement, Old Canada will issue treasury shares to the current owners of Sportscope, John Levy and Alliance Atlantis Communications.

With Old Canada under its belt, Sportscope will be renamed Headline Media Group, in which Levy, aac, Frank Mersch and Griffiths McBurney & Partners will invest an aggregate of approximately $27.5 million as a private placement.

As a result of the transactions, Levy will gain voting control of hmg, with a 49% ownership interest in the new company. aac will own 40%, Mersch will own 5% and Griffiths McBurney will hold 2%.

hmg intends to invest a portion of the private placement funds to capitalize a new investment-focused subsidiary, which will invest in companies with a stake in content production for tv and Internet broadcast.

‘These transactions will enhance our ability to compete for the rights to broadcast properties and other sports properties, in new media and the Internet, and in the development of content and content-enabling technologies for the increasing convergence of the Internet, cable, telecommunications and the media,’ says Levy, president and ceo of Headline Sports.

Headline Sports has approximately 4.8 million subscribers.

The rto is expected to close in November and will be subject to shareholder, crtc and tse approval.

Meantime, Rogers is actively seeking to buy controlling interest in ctv’s rival sports channel Sportsnet, in which it currently owns a 20% stake.

As a condition of ctv’s takeover of Netstar, the crtc has required the broadcaster to divest its 40% interest in Sportsnet by March 2001.

The cable giant recently asked the crtc to revoke its policy inhibiting cablecos from owning a controlling interest, or more than 30%, in a specialty channel. *

-www.allianceatlantis.com