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Disney’s ABC Stations Could Be Bought By Nexstar With “Little Friction” If They Are Sold Off, Company Advisor Tom Carter Says

Y2kTheNewOldies

Y2kTheNewOldies

deadline.com

Disney’s ABC Stations Could Be Bought By Nexstar With “Little Friction” If They Are Sold Off, Company Advisor Tom Carter Says; Hails “Progress” In Lengthy DirecTV Carriage Dispute

Nexstar advisor Tom Carter says the company could buy Disney's local TV stations with "little friction" if they are sold off, as is widely expected.
deadline.com deadline.com

If this is to be true then stations like KABC-TV would be co-owned with KTLA in Los Angeles, KGO-TV would be co-owned with KRON, WLS-TV to be co-owned with WGN, WABC-TV to be co-owned with WPIX, KTRK to be co-owned with KIAH by Nexstar or its related company Mission Broadcasting or divested into another company not related to Nexstar or Disney if this proposal takes place but that will require an FCC approval and SEC approval process.


Tom Carter, a longtime former Nexstar exec who is now a senior advisor to the CEO and board of directors, says the company could acquire Disney’s local ABC TV stations with “little friction” if they become available.

Disney CEO Bob Iger spurred talk of a potential sale of the eight stations over the summer when he said some of the company’s linear TV holdings “may not be core” to the company in the future. Private equity firms are among those putting out feelers, given their sizable investments in local TV in recent years. Nexstar is a poster child for growth through M&A, with Carter estimating that the company pulled off about 40 acquisitions in his first 10 years at the company. Multi-billion-dollar deals for Media General and Tribune Media vaulted what had been a boutique Texas firm two decades ago to the No. 1 spot among all U.S. station owners, and last fall it showed its appetite again by taking a majority stake in The CW.
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translation, Nexstar wants Disney's TV stations, ABC and possibly their cable networks while Disney focuses on movies, TV shows and Disney+/Hulu and not running TV networks anymore.

i think this will not happen cause if anything, i could Disney just spinning it off without selling it to anyone else.

Edit to avoid double posts: i think splitting Disney would be the better option and here's how i'll do it

it will be split to 3 companies:
Walt Disney Company: Disney's movies & TV productions (Walt Disney Pictures, 20th Century, ETC), Disney+, and Disney Channel, Disney Junior & Disney XD and Disney theme parks.

American Broadcasting Company inc (or new Capital Cities): spins of ABC, the ABC O&O stations, ESPN networks (full ownership as they gain the remaining 20% shares of ESPN from Hearst), Freeform, FX Networks, National Geographics networks (NatGeo retains co-ownership of those networks), Hulu and ESPN+.

A&E Networks: all of Disney's 50% shares to A&E Networks is sold to Hearst in exchange for their 20% shares of ESPN.
 
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If Nexstar really gets the Disney owned ABC affiliates then Fresno would have to be one of the places where stations need to be divested to unrelated parties like KFSN given that Nexstar already runs a duopoly in the area KGPE and KSEE.
 
Y2kTheNewOldies said:
KTRK to be co-owned with KIAH by Nexstar
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There is already a relationship between ABC and Nexstar in Houston, as KTRK produces a one-hour 9pm newscast for KIAH. KIAH does produce its own morning news, but it is a fairly simple show with weather and traffic tossing back and forth, plus a few news headlines sprinkled in.

I would assume operations would be combined at the current KTRK building, meaning the end of the longtime KIAH facility. Curious if master control for both would be from the ABC operations center in The Woodlands, Texas (currently running KTRK) or the Nexstar hub in Dallas.
 
Mediafrog+ said:
There is already a relationship between ABC and Nexstar in Houston, as KTRK produces a one-hour 9pm newscast for KIAH. KIAH does produce its own morning news, but it is a fairly simple show with weather and traffic tossing back and forth, plus a few news headlines sprinkled in.

I would assume operations would be combined at the current KTRK building, meaning the end of the longtime KIAH facility. Curious if master control for both would be from the ABC operations center in The Woodlands, Texas (currently running KTRK) or the Nexstar hub in Dallas.
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Yes I remember Nexstar in places like Philadelphia was the other one that have an agreement where Disney's WPVI produces a newscast for WPHL.

Here's another case of Disney and Nexstar with current agreements like KRON and KGO-TV are in the same building but with separate offices and studios. Note the deal with KRON at 900 Front Street San Francisco with KGO goes back to when KRON was owned by Media General.

KRON Moving Into KGO Facility

Sublease as Media General station finds a new San Francisco home at ABC while remaining independent
www.nexttv.com www.nexttv.com

Here is the scenario that is brought up if Nexstar really gets the Disney owned TV stations they would operate as Duopolies like in New Orleans where Nexstar has the primary station WGNO as the ABC Affiliate and the secondary station is WNOL a CW affiliate.

en.wikipedia.org

WNOL-TV - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org


WGNO - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org
 
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Raleigh would be interesting, too, with ABC O&O WTVD 11 and Nexstar-owned CBS affiliate WNCN (CBS 17). We also have locally-owned NBC/Fox duopoly powerhouse Capitol Broadcasting WRAL 5/WRAZ 50 as well as Sinclair duopoly WLFL CW 22 and MNT WRDC 28.
 
www.reuters.com

Mogul Byron Allen makes $10 billion bid for Disney's ABC, other networks

Media entrepreneur Byron Allen has made a $10 billion bid to buy Walt Disney's ABC television network and assets including the FX and National Geographic cable channels, a spokesperson for Allen said on Friday.
www.reuters.com www.reuters.com

Now Disney responds to the proposed deal with Nexstar. If this deal takes place then Nexstar will be involved in the largest affiliation realignment after this group took over the CW and converted some of its stations into CW affiliates.
 
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stationless listener said:
Is there *anyone* that would take a crack at owning one of the original Big 3 other than Nexstar or Sinclair?
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Does Gray, Scripps and Hearst count? Hearst is part owner of ESPN, Scripps owns Ion and owns more ABC affiliates than even the network itself. Nexstar is notable for owning the most Fox Affiliates in larger markets not owned by the network itself.
 
And while we’re at it, if this were to happen Nexstar would have null and void its affiliation deal with CBS, NBC, and Fox in markets they own with a competing ABC affiliate like Memphis, Honolulu, and the Quad Cities (Davenport-Rock Island-Moline).
 
Bloomberg News is reporting Disney is in initial discussions with Nexstar about purchasing the ABC (presumably O&O) stations and network
 
only1moore said:
And while we’re at it, if this were to happen Nexstar would have null and void its affiliation deal with CBS, NBC, and Fox in markets they own with a competing ABC affiliate like Memphis, Honolulu, and the Quad Cities (Davenport-Rock Island-Moline).
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Maybe. If I remember correctly, Westinghouse had a longstanding deal with NBC. All of its TV stations were NBC affiliates. Then Westinghouse merged with CBS. What happened was a trading of affiliations where (for example) longtime Philly station KYW NBC3 became a CBS affiliate, while WCAU CBS10 became NBC. It's just a rebranding.
 
I don't know when that was. KDKA and KPIX were CBS affiliates; WJZ was with ABC. That was long before Westinghouse merged with CBS, at which time KYW and WBZ switched from NBC, and WJZ switched from ABC. That's also when NBC put WBTS on the air in Boston, and ABC took a big hit in Baltimore; it switched to third-place WMAR (part of Scripps' deal to keep WEWS and WXYZ with ABC and a factor in the Westinghouse-CBS deal that switched WJZ.)

So it shook out like this:

Baltimore: WJZ to CBS; WMAR from NBC to ABC; WBAL returns to its original network, NBC
Boston: WBZ to CBS; WHDH from NBC to independent; WBTS goes on the air as an NBC o&o
Philadelphia: KYW from NBC to CBS; WCAU from CBS to NBC
Pittsburgh: no changes
San Francisco: KPIX stays with CBS, but KRON goes from NBC to MyNetwork (and now the CW) and KNTV becomes
an NBC o&o

And to think that if Westinghouse had kept that train wreck in Charlotte, WPCQ, it would be the CBS station and WBTV
would probably be with NBC. I don't think that would fly in the Queen City.
 
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