The media mogul, Mr Rupert Murdoch (70), and his wife, Ms Wendi Deng (33), are expecting their first child - an arrival likely to fuel speculation as to who will eventually control his $36 billion media empire. The child will be Mr Murdoch's fifth and the first for Ms Deng.
His News Corp Ltd, is the fifth-biggest media company in the world and includes Sky Television, the New York Post, HarperCollins, the Times, the Sunday Times, the Sun and News of the World and the News Ltd chain in Australia.
Mr Murdoch has three children with his second wife Anna, to whom he was married for 32 years. They are Elisabeth (32), Lachlan (29) and James (28). His oldest child, Prudence, is the daughter of his first wife, the late Patricia Booker. Ms Deng married Mr Murdoch in June 1999, shortly after his divorce from Ms Anna Torv. Ms Deng is Mr Murdoch's third wife and the daughter of a machine factory official in Guangzhou in southern China. They met when she was an intern at Star TV, the Asian satellite television arm of his conglomerate.