Howard Stern (Creative Commons)

The filed suit alleged that Sirius had paid Stern in stock awards when he signed with them in 2006, but did not continue with payment the following four years even though they were contractually obligated to do so.

"The suit charges that Stern's signing helped Sirius exceed its subscriber targets by at least 2 million subscribers in each year of the contract, triggering a new stock award each time. It also said that Stern put Sirius in a position to complete its 2008 acquisition of XM, which had also courted Stern years earlier," said the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Stern claims that his involvement with Sirius influenced the merger with XM Satellite Radio Inc., which had also wanted Stern to work for their company. Sirius had 230,000 subscribers in 2003, XM had 1.3 million. Since December, the merged company has 20.2 million subscribers.

"New York's Sirius XM had just signed Stern to a second five-year contract, and said it was 'surprised and disappointed' by the lawsuit. The company said it lived up to obligations of their previous deal," said Bloomberg Businessweek.

Reach Roselle here.