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Sinclair pushing takeover of Scripps
- Thread starter Mediafrog+
- Start date
Yes this has some eerie resemblance to Nexstar's proposed role in taking over Tegna. If that's approved there will be multiple overlaps that has to be considered around the country. Some of them is Cincinnati where WCPO is with Scripps and WKRC is with Sinclair. The other is West Palm Beach where Sinclair and Scripps currently have separate operations.
Once again, forget about ownership caps. They are about to be relaxed or eliminated completely.
In DFW it would mean a combination of KTXD and KPXD. At least the calls are already similar.
“Separate operations” will be combined into one.
In some good news, a Scripps spokesperson affirmed. “Likewise, the board will take all steps appropriate to protect the company and the company’s shareholders from the opportunistic actions of Sinclair or anyone else.”
thedesk.net
Scripps board will "protect the company" from "opportunistic" Sinclair
November 17, 2025 - Sinclair and Scripps have discussed a possible tie-up between the two companies, with Sinclair adding pressure through a large purchase of equity in its peer broadcaster.
thedesk.net
Corporate speak. Meaningless.
Recall that TEGNA said it was determined to carry on as an independent company prior to both the failed Standard General takeover as well as the current deal with Nexstar.
True the whole ATSC 3.0 discussion has been used by companies like Sinclair and Nexstar to justify getting more TV Stations from companies like Scripps and Tegna. But how will that work out given that the viewers mainly want TV to connect to a WiFi system to get their shows from their favorite apps. Who is the core demographic for ATSC 3.0 here?
We had similar discussions about the phasing out of HD radio given the attention car makers are looking more at a dashboard app system for cars.
We had similar discussions about the phasing out of HD radio given the attention car makers are looking more at a dashboard app system for cars.
Not much to combine. KPXD is a satellite receiver and a transmitter. KTXD is about the same. Viewers will likely never know the difference, if they care at all.
But ION is a cash cow for Scripps. It might help Sinclair pay for even more stations.
Consolidation is really a necessity. None of the large station owners are performing well financially. The relaxation of the ownership caps to enable this is only an acknowledgement of the reality. Scripps seems like it's undervalued. Maybe the Sinclair offer will bring about rival bids. If not, I welcome the opportunity to get TND and Full Measure OTA in the Detroit market.
Nashville would be an absolute mess: Scripps has WTVF and WNPX, Sinclair has WZTV, WUXP and (on loan in perpetuity) WNAB. Then you have all the diginets owned by both Scripps and Sinclair...
Unfortunately, owners of broadcast stations have that right. We depend on owners to be fair and base their decisions on what their viewers want, rather than the partisan politics of the owner. Generally speaking, owners make decisions for business reasons rather than political reasons.
The good news is that program producers and networks have contracts with these stations. But beyond that, people have choices beyond local stations. So even if Sinclair owns stations that reach large numbers of people, those people can choose to get their programming from owners who don't make programming decisions for political reasons.
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Why is that unfortunate?
I'm not sure the diginets would be impacted from a viewer perspective. None of the stations would be divested, assuming ownership cap rules, as updated, don't preclude this, so there would be ample bandwidth to continue to allocate the diginets, and there isn't much overlap between the content of the respective Scripps and Sinclair diginets. There would be severe consolidation in news and weather operations though.
D
Deleted member 112817
Guest
I think this will be a good thing!
Can you explain why you think it will be good? I’d really like to know.
Because they prevented their viewers from watching Jimmy Kimmel.
D
Deleted member 112817
Guest
What’s wrong having BOTH sides of the politics??
It's unfortunet because if they don't air say a primetime show from the network that they cary that some of the people want to see that means they don't really care about the viewers in their markets. Plus, it shows they don't care if people go to streaming. I would think they would want to keep people watching on the local station instead on a app like say Hulu for example.
D
Deleted member 112817
Guest
This is going to happen everywhere. It will be interesting to see whether independents like Bahakel and Albritton will stay independent.