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Fox Gets A Station in The Bay Area

Some in this thread would do well to take a refresher course in TV syndication economics.

I would think Media General would be a more willing seller of KRON-TV than Cox of KTVU, thus KRON-TV could be had at a more attractive price assuming Cox were even willing to sell KTVU. No affiliation swap need take place.

If the KRON-TV building is in such bad shape, why is it still occupied and why did they scrap plans to move out? They've had 24 years going back to Chronicle days to repair any damage from the 1989 earthquake. I was in that building several years ago and no mention was made of it being unsound.

Did KTVU's pilot-name gaffe impact their news ratings in any meaningful way?

If KRON-TV had the money, which I doubt they do, they could rent space in a building that's freeway close and make it their ENG garage and park and dispatch their vehicles from it. I'm old enough to remember when KQED occupied three buildings in the early '70s. They had two buildings on 4th street (one for studios, offices, videotape and M.C.) and one across 4th street for the art and film departments. They also had the building at 8th and Bryant which housed channel 32 which had just been given to them by Metromedia, as well as housing KQED-FM.

Fox owned the former KBHK/channel 44 for a few months in2001. It picked up KBHK with the acquisition of the Chris Craft/United Television station group and sold it to Viacom shortly thereafter.
 
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Media General would be willing to allow NBC to acquire KRON and move all of KRON operations to NBC Bay Area facilities and continues to own KSTS in San Jose with a news bureau in San Francisco and spins off KNTV to a joint venture of Cowles and News Press Gazette in which Cowles fully owns and News Press Gazette manages KNTV while News Press Gazette fully owns KION as well as moving KNTV operations inside KION studios in Salinas, California with building a new broadcasting transmitter serving the Salinas/Montgomery Bay TV DMA and picks up the ABC affiliation from KSBW.
 
jamesjimcie said:
Media General would be willing to allow NBC to acquire KRON and move all of KRON operations to NBC Bay Area facilities and continues to own KSTS in San Jose with a news bureau in San Francisco and spins off KNTV to a joint venture of Cowles and News Press Gazette in which Cowles fully owns and News Press Gazette manages KNTV while News Press Gazette fully owns KION as well as moving KNTV operations inside KION studios in Salinas, California with building a new broadcasting transmitter serving the Salinas/Montgomery Bay TV DMA and picks up the ABC affiliation from KSBW.
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Huh? Here we go again.That was hard to follow. I'd like to suggest an alternative - everybody could just do nothing and leave all the TV channels allocated just as they are now. That's most likely to happen.

I'll ask it again - why does NBC need to be on Channel 4? Because it's on Channel 4 in LA, New York and maybe a couple of other markets? Because San Francisco technically no longer has an NBC affiliate? In this high-def satellite/cable world, nobody cares about channel allocations or city of license outside of radio and TV nerds.

Change confuses people. I'm pretty TV and radio savvy, but when I moved to the Bay Area, it took me some weeks before I stopped automatically tuning to Channel 2 to watch CBS (I grew up in LA).

I just switched from Comcast to DirecTV. I love it, but they allocate KNTV to Channel 11, and I keep tuning to Channel 3. Direct also puts 20 on 20 (I'm used to 13) and 44 on 44 (I'm used to 12). This makes perfect sense, but I will need some time to get used to it.

Down with change!:rolleyes:
 
jamesjimcie said:
Media General would be willing to allow NBC to acquire KRON and move all of KRON operations to NBC Bay Area facilities and continues to own KSTS in San Jose with a news bureau in San Francisco and spins off KNTV to a joint venture of Cowles and News Press Gazette in which Cowles fully owns and News Press Gazette manages KNTV while News Press Gazette fully owns KION as well as moving KNTV operations inside KION studios in Salinas, California with building a new broadcasting transmitter serving the Salinas/Montgomery Bay TV DMA and picks up the ABC affiliation from KSBW.
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They would, would they?
 
Cox would let FOX take ownership of KTVU. FOX would move directly into the Jack London Square Broadcast Facilities. No questions asked. They would simply open the doors and give FOX the keys.
 
1069_KIFR said:
Cox would let FOX take ownership of KTVU. FOX would move directly into the Jack London Square Broadcast Facilities. No questions asked. They would simply open the doors and give FOX the keys.
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But why would that happen? Would Cox want to sell what is likely a cash-cow they probably owe no debt on? Would Fox be willing to pay the fortune Cox would likely want for KTVU? Does Fox want a Bay Area O&O badly enough that they'd threaten a first-rate affiliate that they would remove Fox programming from KTVU if they don't sell...legal extortion in other words? And if they did, would Fox be able to back up their threat with a back-up plan (i.e.: buying KRON) if Cox told them to f**k off?

It all seems unlikely to me
 
LKellerIII said:
But why would that happen? Would Cox want to sell what is likely a cash-cow they probably owe no debt on? Would Fox be willing to pay the fortune Cox would likely want for KTVU? Does Fox want a Bay Area O&O badly enough that they'd threaten a first-rate affiliate that they would remove Fox programming from KTVU if they don't sell...legal extortion in other words? And if they did, would Fox be able to back up their threat with a back-up plan (i.e.: buying KRON) if Cox told them to f**k off?

It all seems unlikely to me
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Llew:

Those are all reasonable questions.

A couple of things I've learned over three decades in TV:

Everybody has an exit plan for every one of their properties.

Everything is for sale at the right price.

Even without debt, it would take KTVU 10-15 years of profits, maybe more to equal the immediate bottom-line impact of a sale at what I would imagine market value for KTVU to be.

If Cox sees value in having that much money now instead of installments of profit over the long run, that's all they need.

Well, that and an offer from FOX.

And if you go back and look at the history of affiliate swaps and O&O purchases over the past 20 years, you'll find that if a network really wants to make a move (and we don't have confirmation that FOX does), they make it. If FOX wants an O&O and can't do a deal with KTVU, they'll talk to KRON.

But again, I've seen nothing other than unfounded speculation so far.
 
Michael,

I do understand. Not to sound like Justice Scalia, but corporations are like people (at least in this regard). Everybody has an "exit plan." I love where I live, and my house. My current plan is to die there...hopefully not for 40 more years. But I get inquiries from real estate firms all the time, and if anybody ever offers me a couple hundred K over market value, I would probably be out of there in a heartbeat.

Young Broadcasting and the afforementioned KRON can serve as an object lesson. NBC was interested in KRON, but was smart enough to bow out when Young outbid them because NBC realized $800 million was too much to pay. Even though News Corp has much more financial clout than Young, I can't see them paying too much for KTVU just to have an O&O in the Bay Area. When I think about it, buying poor pathetic KRON may be their best opportunity.
 
LKellerIII said:
Michael,

I do understand. Not to sound like Justice Scalia, but corporations are like people (at least in this regard). Everybody has an "exit plan." I love where I live, and my house. My current plan is to die there...hopefully not for 40 more years. But I get inquiries from real estate firms all the time, and if anybody ever offers me a couple hundred K over market value, I would probably be out of there in a heartbeat.

Young Broadcasting and the afforementioned KRON can serve as an object lesson. NBC was interested in KRON, but was smart enough to bow out when Young outbid them because NBC realized $800 million was too much to pay. Even though News Corp has much more financial clout than Young, I can't see them paying too much for KTVU just to have an O&O in the Bay Area. When I think about it, buying poor pathetic KRON may be their best opportunity.
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Llew:

Good points.

I do think that even market price would give Cox 10-15 years of profit all at once in today's dollars. That could be enough.

KRON is best looked at as buying the signal. Everything else needs work. So even if Cox gets a little greedy, if the tab for KRON, a new or re-habbed building and equipment, promotion regarding the move of FOX programming to a new channel and a few years of underperforming revenues from lowered ratings caused by viewer confusion is the same or more than an inflated offer, KTVU might be the better move.
 
Why Would Fox Buy a new TV Station at this point? This is especially when News Corp and 21st century Fox split apart and they still have to prove to investors that the split is a good move? I would wait a few years for that.
 
michael hagerty said:
Llew:

Good points.

I do think that even market price would give Cox 10-15 years of profit all at once in today's dollars. That could be enough.

KRON is best looked at as buying the signal. Everything else needs work. So even if Cox gets a little greedy, if the tab for KRON, a new or re-habbed building and equipment, promotion regarding the move of FOX programming to a new channel and a few years of underperforming revenues from lowered ratings caused by viewer confusion is the same or more than an inflated offer, KTVU might be the better move.
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Or to draw an automotive analogy, KTVU is a low mileage 2011 Lexus IS 350, and KRON is a 1997 Daewoo Lanos with 150,000 miles.

Can you still get parts for a very used TV station?
 
LKellerIII said:
Or to draw an automotive analogy, KTVU is a low mileage 2011 Lexus IS 350, and KRON is a 1997 Daewoo Lanos with 150,000 miles.

Can you still get parts for a very used TV station?
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Nice one, Llew!

If KRON's gone HD, most of the serious hardware's probably pretty new, but FOX would likely remodel Van Ness or move. The big question mark is how far your ratings drop when you move the network and for how long. And in a market the size of the Bay Area, the impact can be felt on the national Neilsen averages as well as the local level. The impact could be several million dollars over a couple of years...in which case, you're better off just giving Cox more and amortizing the expense rather than losing money you won't make back.
 
There's another way for NBC to buy KRON is that they move all of KNTV programming with the NBC affiliation and fold KNTV completely to KRON 4(transmitting on DTV RF 38) from Sutro Tower and donate KNTV transmitting equipment to KCSM 60 to use to transmit(currently transmitting on DTV RF 43) from San Bruno Mountain on DTV RF 12 just like John Fetzer did in 1954 when he bought out both KOLN on 12 and KFOR on 10 in Lincoln by completely moving and folding KFOR 10 to KOLN to operate on channel 10 and donating channel 12 to the University Of Nebraska at Lincoln to launch KUON on channel 12 in December 1954 to eventually become part of the statewide Nebraska Educational Telecommunication Network as it is today.
 
jamesjimcie said:
There's another way for NBC to buy KRON is that they move all of KNTV programming with the NBC affiliation and fold KNTV completely to KRON 4(transmitting on DTV RF 38) from Sutro Tower and donate KNTV transmitting equipment to KCSM 60 to use to transmit(currently transmitting on DTV RF 43) from San Bruno Mountain on DTV RF 12 just like John Fetzer did in 1954 when he bought out both KOLN on 12 and KFOR on 10 in Lincoln by completely moving and folding KFOR 10 to KOLN to operate on channel 10 and donating channel 12 to the University Of Nebraska at Lincoln to launch KUON on channel 12 in December 1954 to eventually become part of the statewide Nebraska Educational Telecommunication Network as it is today.
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Gee, you frequency swapping fantsizers really don't give up, do you? No offense, but reading your posts is like trying to decipher the instructions for assembling my propane grill.

Michael - KRON has gone HD.
 
LKellerIII said:
Gee, you frequency swapping fantsizers really don't give up, do you? No offense, but reading your posts is like trying to decipher the instructions for assembling my propane grill.

Michael - KRON has gone HD.
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Thanks, Llew. So the guts of the station are pretty contemporary. FOX would just have to address the building itself and whether they would want to be there.
 
jamesjimcie said:
There's another way for NBC to buy KRON is that they move all of KNTV programming with the NBC affiliation and fold KNTV completely to KRON 4(transmitting on DTV RF 38) from Sutro Tower and donate KNTV transmitting equipment to KCSM 60 to use to transmit(currently transmitting on DTV RF 43) from San Bruno Mountain on DTV RF 12 just like John Fetzer did in 1954 when he bought out both KOLN on 12 and KFOR on 10 in Lincoln by completely moving and folding KFOR 10 to KOLN to operate on channel 10 and donating channel 12 to the University Of Nebraska at Lincoln to launch KUON on channel 12 in December 1954 to eventually become part of the statewide Nebraska Educational Telecommunication Network as it is today.
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And....hopefully with punctuation.....why would they want to do that?
 
michael hagerty said:
What is a dead cause?
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Making NBC buy Channel 4 is a dead cause and making fox go to KRON 4 why would Fox do that? Look as long as KTVU gets good ratings during KTVU News and Fox Sports programming and pays the Fox Royalties then I don't see why Fox Needs Channel 4 and Channel 2.
 
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