AFP - Comcast announced plans on Thursday to buy a majority stake in NBC Universal from General Electric, giving the US cable giant a media and entertainment empire to rival that of The Walt Disney Co.

Comcast will control a 51 percent stake of NBC Universal with GE, which owned 80 percent, retaining the other 49 percent and France's Vivendi selling its 20-percent stake in NBC Universal to GE for 5.8 billion dollars.

The proposed joint venture would combine Comcast's cable television and high-speed broadband operations with NBC Universal's news, movie and television programming, creating an unparalleled merger of distribution and content.

"Today?s announced transaction will increase our capabilities in content and cable networks," Comcast chief executive Brian Roberts said.

Facts: NBC Universal "This deal is a perfect fit for Comcast and will allow us to become a leader in the development and distribution of multiplatform 'anytime, anywhere' media that American consumers are demanding," he said in a statement.

The deal vaults Comcast into the ranks of the media and entertainment elite alongside Disney, News Corp. and Time Warner and is certain to draw regulatory scrutiny which some company officials said could take up to two years.

Democratic Representative Henry Waxman of California, chairman of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, said it "has the potential to reshape the media marketplace."

"This proposal raises questions regarding diversity, competition, and the future of the production and distribution of video content across broadcasting, cable, online, and mobile platforms," Waxman said in a statement.

"It is imperative that the (Federal Communications Commission), the Justice Department, and the (Federal Trade Commission) rigorously assess whether this transaction is in the public interest."

The FCC said it will "carefully examine the proposed merger and will be thorough, fair, and fact-based in its review."

Comcast said in a statement that it will pay GE around 6.5 billion dollars in cash. In addition, Comcast will "contribute its programming businesses and certain other properties valued at 7.25 billion dollars."

The joint venture would have debts of nine billion dollars. It values NBC Universal at 30 billion dollars.

The deal comes five years after Comcast's failed 54-billion-dollar takeover bid for Disney.

It gives the cable TV giant control of one of Hollywood most storied film studios, Universal Pictures, which has churned out a stream of Oscar-winning movies from "All Quiet on the Western Front" in 1930 to "To Kill a Mockingbird" (1962), "The Deer Hunter" (1978) and "Schindler's List" (1993).

Universal was merged with MCA in the 1950s and then sold in the 1990s to Canadian spirits group Seagram before being acquired by Vivendi, which was a French water utility firm.

Comcast to join media and entertainment elite NBC's cable and broadcast television holdings include flagship NBC -- the oldest of the four major US broadcast networks along with ABC, CBS and Fox -- financial news channel CNBC, 24-hour cable television news channel MSNBC, The Weather Channel, Bravo and Spanish-language broadcast network Telemundo.

Comcast operates several television channels including the Style Network, the Golf Channel and E! Entertainment Television, and is active on the Web with Fancast.com, an online video portal, movie ticketing service Fandango and online address book and social network Plaxo.

Comcast will attempt to break the curse of companies seeking to marry content and delivery, such as AOL and Time Warner.

Time Warner is in the process of spinning off its Internet unit AOL and has shed its cable holdings to concentrate on media and entertainment.

News Corp. sold its satellite television service DirecTV in 2008 to Liberty Media.

Comcast chief operating officer Stephen Burke said he believed it was possible to successfully merge the two.

"In our mind, content and distribution go together very naturally," Burke said. "Obviously not everyone believes that, but we really look forward to proving that they do in the months ahead."

Jeff Zucker, the current president and chief executive of NBC Universal, will be chief executive of the new joint venture and will report to Burke.

Comcast shares were up 6.49 percent at mid-day in New York at 15.91 dollars while GE shares rose 1.0 percent to 16.23 dollars.