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McGraw Hill stations up for grabs

PTBoardOp94

PTBoardOp94

The Wall Street Journal and other media outlets report today that McGraw Hill will sell its TV group. The company owns 9 licenses:

KMGH/Denver (ABC)
KGTV/San Diego (ABC)
KZSD-LP/San Diego (Azteca)
WRTV/Indianapolis (ABC)
KZKC-LP/Kansas City (Azteca)
KZCO-LP, KZCS-LP, KZFZ-LP /Denver-Colorado Springs (Azteca)
KERO/Bakersfield (ABC)

http://blogs.wsj.com/deals/2011/06/14/the-incredibly-shrinking-mcgraw-hill/

I believe McGraw-Hill has been a player in television for 40 years or so. MGH bought Indianapolis, San Diego, and Bakersfield in the early 70s. I don't know if they owned any TV before that deal.

Likely buyers?
 
If Disney ABC were smart they'd buy KGTV San Diego and make it an O&O. It's the only major market in California that's not an O&O
 
The only station I believe wouldn't stay an ABC O&O long is KERO-TV, if ABC buys these stations. I also don't see them keeping the low power stations, unless they're needed to boost coverage to areas where the main station doesn't cover the market well. With Bakersfield, CA being ranked that low market wise, that's the reason I don't see it being an O&O for long. If they do buy the stations, then it's guaranteed that the Livewell Network will be placed on these stations & once affiliations for Aztec America & The Cool TV expire, those networks will be gone. Also, they'll have dual 720p HD channels, and have Livewell Network in HD. They would at least have Livewell network on KERO-TV (Livewell not likely to be in HD), then make the new owner carry it as a condition to the purchase of the station. Providing the VHF ownership limit isn't still in place, then ABC could purchase these stations, as 3 of the 4 McGraw-Hill stations are on the VHF (WRTV is now a UHF station on RF 25 while KERO-TV was a UHF on RF 23, but now a VHF on RF 10). Out of the current stations ABC currently owns, WLS-TV (translator is on RF 7) Chicago & KFSN-TV Fresno, CA are the only 2 stations on the UHF (WLS-TV on RF 44, due to the FCC not wanting to grant a much higher power increase to protect WOOD-TV Grand Rapids, & gave up on VHF, & KFSN chose to go back to RF 30 instead of retaining pre-transitional RF 9).
 
ABC is selling, not buying.

KERO will probably not wind up in the same hands as the other three. It's a black sheep in comparison to the rest of the station group.
 
There's not a separate UHF/VHF ownership cap per se, just a "UHF discount" under which only 50% of the population in a UHF station's market counted against the total national ownership cap (35% of total population, IIRC).

ABC/Disney is way below that cap, and would stay way below that cap even if it swallowed the McGraw-Hill stations...but I don't see them becoming O&Os. The networks just aren't buying, because local stations (especially outside the top 10 markets) just aren't the cash cows they once were. There's probably more money for ABC in taking affiliation payments from a new owner in the McGraw-Hill markets than in running the stations itself. They'd be good fits for any number of medium- to large-sized ownership groups like Hearst or Scripps or Journal, or even Newport or Nexstar.
 
Radio3787 said:
If Disney ABC were smart they'd buy KGTV San Diego and make it an O&O. It's the only major market in California that's not an O&O
Click to expand...
As long as they can do it without the LiveWell that all O&Os deal with. Not only will you get trashed HD but TheCoolTV will be gone replaced with LW in both HD & SD. :(
 
Mark said:
What's the chance of a duopoly in the markets?
Click to expand...

Pretty close to nil, since you can't have a duopoly where more than one of the stations is in the top four in ratings. Denver and Indianapolis already have duopolies in place (NBC/My for Gannett in Denver, CBS/My for LIN and Fox/CW for Tribune in Indy). Denver's Fox and CW affiliates also have an LMA in place, though they have separate owners. That leaves CBS in Denver and Dispatch/NBC in Indy as standalone operators.

In San Diego, it's at least remotely possible that Bay City TV (which programs XETV/CW) or indie KUSI could create a duopoly with KGTV. The other big operators in the market - NBC, Midwest Television's KFMB and Tribune's KSWB/Fox - would not be eligible.

And Bakersfield doesn't have enough stations in the market to allow for an official duopoly, though it's possible that a shell company could acquire KERO and put it into a shared-services agreement with one of the other players in town.
 
Scott Fybush said:
Mark said:
What's the chance of a duopoly in the markets?
Click to expand...
And Bakersfield doesn't have enough stations in the market to allow for an official duopoly, though it's possible that a shell company could acquire KERO and put it into a shared-services agreement with one of the other players in town.
Click to expand...

That'd be disastrous, but it's sadly a common occurrence now in small markets...
 
OK, you don't have to scream! :) My point is that
the person I was responding to said that San Diego
is the only large market in California without an o&o,
and I was sure that was incorrect. All of the big
four have o&os in Los Angeles; ABC, CBS, and NBC in
San Francisco; CBS in Sacramento; ABC in Fresno; and
I was sure NBC has one in San Diego. For the record,
Gannett owns the ABC affiliate in Sacramento.

I wouldn't mind seeing Belo or Cox acquiring some of these
McGraw-Hill stations either.
 
PTBoardOp94 said:
The Wall Street Journal and other media outlets report today that McGraw Hill will sell its TV group. The company owns 9 licenses:

KMGH/Denver (ABC)
KGTV/San Diego (ABC)
KZSD-LP/San Diego (Azteca)
WRTV/Indianapolis (ABC)
KZKC-LP/Kansas City (Azteca)
KZCO-LP, KZCS-LP, KZFZ-LP /Denver-Colorado Springs (Azteca)
KERO/Bakersfield (ABC)

http://blogs.wsj.com/deals/2011/06/14/the-incredibly-shrinking-mcgraw-hill/

I believe McGraw-Hill has been a player in television for 40 years or so. MGH bought Indianapolis, San Diego, and Bakersfield in the early 70s. I don't know if they owned any TV before that deal.

Likely buyers?
Click to expand...

Wow, this is big news considering that they've had the same core four stations for so very long, and that they have held on to the same group even as other publisher-broadcasters (Hearst, Belo, Scripps, Gannett, News Corp., etc.) have gotten bigger over the years while others have sold out and disappeared.

For the record, the main four stations were all acquired by McGraw-Hill from another publishing company -- Time-Life -- in the same 1972 transaction that put McGraw-Hill in the broadcasting business and basically took Time-Life out of it, leaving them with one station in Grand Rapids (WOOD-TV).
 
bpatrick said:
OK, you don't have to scream! :) My point is that
the person I was responding to said that San Diego
is the only large market in California without an o&o,
and I was sure that was incorrect. All of the big
four have o&os in Los Angeles; ABC, CBS, and NBC in
San Francisco; CBS in Sacramento; ABC in Fresno; and
I was sure NBC has one in San Diego. For the record,
Gannett owns the ABC affiliate in Sacramento.

I wouldn't mind seeing Belo or Cox acquiring some of these
McGraw-Hill stations either.
Click to expand...

I was actually going to post Belo last night. They could definitely afford it. Their flagship (WFAA) is an ABC affiliate and their stations carry Livewell.
 
KZKC-LP is in Bakersfield, not Kansas City.

Very few entities are in "buy" mode right now. There was a private equity group attempting a hostile takeover of Fisher Broadcasting; I wonder if they would want McGraw-Hill's stations instead.
 
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