Why SyFy canceled SGU

Disclaimer: The post is all my personal opinion, based on some facts

I'd like to add a few of my own thoughts here about why SGU was cancelled. It's all speculation and I've said it before.

Just before MGM entered a pre-packaged bankruptcy, SyFy was probably considering picking the show up for the third season, but after MGM entered bankruptcy proceedings and before it emerged from bankruptcy (a matter of just a few weeks or even less, I might add), SyFy decided not to pick up SGU for S3.

The reason, which is all speculation and inference – is based on the facts that before MGM entered bankruptcy, it was 20% owned by Comcast, which owns 51% of NBC Universal (the other 49% owned by General Electric), which owns SyFy; and 20% of MGM owned by Sony. Thus, with both Comcast/NBC Universal & Sony owning 40% of MGM, it was still (simultaneously) a competitor to them.

After MGM emerged from a pre-packaged bankruptcy, the former owners didn't own it anymore.

Right after it became clear that Comcast+GE/NBC Universal (owner of SyFy) wouldn't own 20% of MGM anymore, any incentive for Comcast's television property to cough up 50% production costs to produce more SGU evaporated. — To reiterate, just because SyFy's parent company/ies didn't own 20% of MGM anymore. (The production went roughly $2 mil. per episode, AFAIK, with 50% by MGM proper.)

And imagine how all the money really ran around. I would love for some regulator to look into this.

My opinion is that SyFy's move of SGU to a terrible timeslot was intentional and I assume, that more than anyone else were Comcast/NBC Universal/SyFy aware that MGM would eventually go into bankruptcy after which they wouldn't own it anymore. Letting SGU fail ratings-wise worked as a convenient excuse not to finance its production any further.
</end of speculation>

The only facts are who and how much anyone owned MGM and who then did not own MGM at which time and who did then and still owns SyFy/NBC. See MGM Holdings article at Wikipedia.

Everyone knew that MGM were haemorraging money like crazy and most potential buyers wanted as a condition of any sale of MGM for it to go through bankruptcy, so that MGM would not be under its former owners. Source here.

Where I think SyFy is culpable in letting SGU's ratings go is shuffling SGU's air times too much; Joseph Mallozzi directly (AFAIK) blames moving SGU to Tuesdays against "Dancing with the Stars" (and starlets) and NCIS (a police-procedural show), in a time of year that is not Summer; I also noticed indirect finger-pointing at what I understand to be rather creative accounting practices (search for Bailey writes in text) over at skiffy. Now it cancelled Eureka.