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Entercom CBS merger okayed by DOJ, swaps with iHeart, Benneville and Beasley

AMRocks

AMRocks

From the press release:

Including the previously announced agreement by Entercom to divest three stations to Educational Media Foundation (EMF), Entercom and CBS Radio have agreed to divest a total of 19 radio stations in the markets of Boston, Los Angeles, Sacramento, San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle and Wilkes-Barre. Collectively, Entercom will receive 11 stations in the Boston, Chattanooga and Richmond markets.

iHeartMedia Asset Exchange Agreement
Under the terms of the asset exchange agreement, iHeartMedia will receive four stations in Boston and three stations in Seattle. Entercom will receive six stations in Richmond and four stations in Chattanooga. As a result of the agreement, Entercom will enter two new markets in Richmond and Chattanooga. The iHeartMedia transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2018. The complete list of stations in the asset exchange agreement include:

Stations to be divested to iHeartMedia
Market Current Owner Station Format
Boston CBS Radio WBZ-AM News
Boston CBS Radio WZLX-FM Classic Rock
Boston Entercom WKAF-FM Urban Adult Contemporary
Boston Entercom WRKO-AM News/Talk
Seattle CBS Radio KFNQ-AM Sports
Seattle CBS Radio KJAQ-FM Adult Hits
Seattle CBS Radio KZOK-FM Classic Rock
iHeartMedia stations to be acquired by Entercom
Market Station Format
Chattanooga WLND-FM Adult Hits
Chattanooga WKXJ-FM Top 40
Chattanooga WRXR-FM Mainstream Rock
Chattanooga WUSY-FM Country
Richmond WBTJ-FM Hip Hop & R&B
Richmond WRNL-AM Sports
Richmond WRVA-AM News/Talk
Richmond WRVQ-FM Top 40
Richmond WRXL-FM Alternative Rock
Richmond WTVR-FM Adult Contemporary

Beasley Asset Exchange Agreement
Under the terms of the asset exchange agreement, Beasley will receive one station in Boston. Entercom will receive WMJX-FM, one of Boston’s leading heritage stations, and $12 million in cash consideration. The Beasley transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2018. The complete list of stations in the asset exchange agreement include:

Station to be divested to Beasley
Market Current Owner Station Format
Boston CBS Radio WBZ-FM Sports
Beasley station to be acquired by Entercom
Market Stations Format
Boston WMJX-FM Adult Contemporary

Bonneville Local Marketing Agreement
Under the terms of the LMA, Bonneville will program four stations in San Francisco and four stations in Sacramento. The LMA will become effective upon the closing of the Entercom and CBS Radio merger. The complete list of stations in the LMA include:

Stations to be programmed by Bonneville
Market Current Owner Station Format
San Francisco CBS Radio KMVQ-FM Top 40
San Francisco Entercom KBLX-FM Urban Adult Contemporary
San Francisco Entercom KOIT-FM Adult Contemporary
San Francisco Entercom KUFX-FM Classic Rock
Sacramento CBS Radio KHTK-AM Sports
Sacramento CBS Radio KNCI-FM Country
Sacramento CBS Radio KYMX-FM Adult Contemporary
Sacramento CBS Radio KZZO-FM Hot Adult Contemporary
 
First of all, sorry for the typo. Bonneville.

I find it interesting that:
1) Entercom is breaking up WBZ -- sending the FM to one company and the AM to another
2) I believe this is the end for WBZ-AM and WRKO. iHeart sucks at news/talk. They'll make tons of cuts at WBZ. WRKO will end up being all syndicated. They'll move all the Premiere product from 1430 to the better signal (and more well known call letters.) 1430 will be either sold off or leased to someone.
3) Entercom gets to keep another big FM in Boston yet satisfies the question of owning too much sports in one town.
4) They pick up some really big players (Like WUSY) in some smaller but solid markets. It removes iHeart totally from Richmond and Chattanooga. And iHeart gets some pretty big stations in large markets. (They seem to come out on top in the deal, IMHO. iHeart IS paying them cash in the deal, although it does not say how much.)
 
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DavidEduardo said:


They seem to do a great job with ones like KFI, KOGO, WOAI, WTAM, WLW, WTVN and KOA.
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I was thinking more about how they chopped employees, like in Miami and NYC.

They'll never have a huge ratings winner in news talk like Cox or CBS. But I guess it's not about ratings -- it's about $$ coming in.
 
I listen to 103.7 Kiss FM on my iHeartRadio app, and now that I found out Entercom will acquire iHeartMedia's Chattanooga cluster, I'll have one less station to listen to, although I don't have plans to jump ship to radio.com at this time.

I'm surprised that iHeartMedia didn't replace Ken, Kelly, and Daniel on U.S. 101 with Bobby Bones. Ironically, Bobby Bones was originally on 103.7 Kiss FM until his move to country radio, and currently runs Elvis Duran.
 
miketheradioguy said:
I listen to 103.7 Kiss FM on my iHeartRadio app, and now that I found out Entercom will acquire iHeartMedia's Chattanooga cluster, I'll have one less station to listen to, although I don't have plans to jump ship to radio.com at this time.
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I suspect 103.7 Kiss will also be available on TuneIn. I tend to go between iHeart and TuneIn quite-a-bit. In my car, I'll occasionally listen to Radio.com and RadioPup as well, though it's usually iHeart, TuneIn and SiriusXM in the wife's. For some reason, Radio.com and RadioPup don't change channels or deal with buffering well when plugged into her car, though I use Bluetooth on mine.

By the way, if you're a regular iHeart listener, you might notice Alpha has been quietly adding its stations to its app.
 
Kent said:
I suspect 103.7 Kiss will also be available on TuneIn. I tend to go between iHeart and TuneIn quite-a-bit. In my car, I'll occasionally listen to Radio.com and RadioPup as well, though it's usually iHeart, TuneIn and SiriusXM in the wife's. For some reason, Radio.com and RadioPup don't change channels or deal with buffering well when plugged into her car, though I use Bluetooth on mine.

By the way, if you're a regular iHeart listener, you might notice Alpha has been quietly adding its stations to its app.
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I don't use Tunein because I'm currently satisfied with iHeartRadio, although I'm ready to see how the radio.com app will change once the CBS Radio-Entercom merger closes. Also, I never knew that Alpha Media's adding their stations to the iHeartRadio app.
 
AMRocks said:
iHeart gets some pretty big stations in large markets. (They seem to come out on top in the deal, IMHO. iHeart IS paying them cash in the deal, although it does not say how much.)
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I agree...that was my first thought when I saw the news. Boston & Seattle for Chattanooga & Richmond doesn't seem like a fair deal, even with some cash (probably to be paid later). As the announcement came closer, the Boston move seemed obvious to me, at least for WRKO, which carries the big iHeart syndicated talkers. The similarity to WOR was just too close. The fact is that WBZ was not a 24/7 news station, like KYW or WINS. So it fits more with what iHeart does.

No Hubbard (no surprise) and no Cumulus (which might get rumors started again). As we have said, Cumulus has less to trade. And perhaps their financial situation is more dire, given yesterday's news.
 
TheBigA said:
I agree...that was my first thought when I saw the news. Boston & Seattle for Chattanooga & Richmond doesn't seem like a fair deal, even with some cash (probably to be paid later). As the announcement came closer, the Boston move seemed obvious to me, at least for WRKO, which carries the big iHeart syndicated talkers. The similarity to WOR was just too close. The fact is that WBZ was not a 24/7 news station, like KYW or WINS. So it fits more with what iHeart does.

No Hubbard (no surprise) and no Cumulus (which might get rumors started again). As we have said, Cumulus has less to trade. And perhaps their financial situation is more dire, given yesterday's news.
Click to expand...

Looks like the cow has jumped over the moon, as this trade confirmed my rumors you tried to debunk about iHeartMedia planning to sell some of their Virginia/Carolina stations.
 
miketheradioguy said:
Looks like the cow has jumped over the moon, as this trade confirmed my rumors about iHeartMedia planning to sell some of their Virginia/Carolina stations you tried to debunk a while ago.
Click to expand...

They didn't sell anything, and didn't trade any stations in North or South Carolina. Chattanooga is in Tennessee. So I stand by what I said.

The trade of Chattanooga is a surprise because WUSY has been a perennial country powerhouse, winning multiple CMA Awards. The current PD is also the PD for Premiere's syndicated country programming, so that situation will have to be addressed.
 
Jonathan7157 said:
What about the trademarks for the iHeart stations, such as Kiss FM in Chattanooga when the divestment is done?
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I'm not privy to anything that happened in this deal, but deals like this typically include a license to use the existing branding, at least for a period of time. If Entercom wants to use the name, it'll probably be allowed to do it.
 
Kent said:
I'm not privy to anything that happened in this deal, but deals like this typically include a license to use the existing branding, at least for a period of time. If Entercom wants to use the name, it'll probably be allowed to do it.
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iHeart licenses some of its registered names to third party broadcasters, such as The Beat in San Antonio and Kiss in Albuquerque to name just two cases. Likely they just gave consent to continue using the name as part of the deal.
 
http://news.radio-online.com/cgi-bin/rol.exe/headline_id=b15244

Update for entercom

Entercom Communications reported third quarter net revenues increased 1% to $122.3 million from $121.6 million in 2016. Operating income was $13.5 million, after $8.8 million of merger and acquisition costs (CBS Radio), compared to $25.7 million. Same station net revenues decreased by 1%, excluding political while adjusted EBITDA decreased 12% to $26.7 million. The company posted a net income of $8.1 million (9 cents per diluted share) as compared to $6.4 million (28 cents) in the year-ago period.

President/CEO David J. Field stated, "These are exciting times at Entercom as we count down the days before closing our game changing merger with CBS Radio. Entercom will be one of the radio industry's two largest companies with an extraordinary lineup of highly rated, award winning radio stations, digital platforms and live events and a robust set of meaningful scale-driven value-creation opportunities. We are looking forward to deploying our extensive plans to drive growth in the business through a significant series of enhancements and investments across the organization."

On November 1, the company announced a settlement with the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice that will allow it to move forward with its proposed merger with CBS Radio. Entercom now expects the transaction to close as early as November 17, pending approval from the FCC.

In anticipation of the completion of its merger with CBS Radio and consistent with its policy of balancing debt repayment with returns to shareholders, the Entercom announced today that it has increased its dividend to an annual amount of $0.36 per share, beginning with the dividend to be paid in the fourth quarter of 2017. A quarterly dividend of $0.09 per share will paid on December 15, 2017 to shareholders of record on November 28.
Click to expand...
 
RadioPatrol said:
http://savewbz1030.com/

Apparently this came out where a petition has appeared and its for Entercom to stop WBZ Radio from going to Iheart.
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It's bad enough that people are protesting the sale of WBZ to iHeartMedia. What would've been much worse would be a massive format shakeup in the Boston market that would totally confuse listeners as a result of the CBS Radio-Entercom merger. Thankfully, Entercom has reached a settlement with the DOJ, and I have debunked any rumors about EMF acquiring one of Entercom's divestitures in Boston.
 
And finally, he makes it clear.

I've only recently come to realize that what irritates me most about Mike's fantasy league is its gross lack of humanity. Radio isn't just about swapping frequencies, call letters, owners and formats. There are human beings who've spent careers helping to build these radio stations who likely may soon be out of work. I get it. I've been there. I've lost jobs and I've gained jobs with changes in ownership and format. But that doesn't dismiss that with your blanket "you could care less what happens" once iHeart takes over you've again shown a seemingly willful ignorance regarding the lives affected by the changes you so enjoy speculating about. Try spending a few hours in a radio station that has just fired a morning show or a program director. You'll find that game you so enjoy isn't quite as much fun as you seem to think.
 
WorldFamous said:
And finally, he makes it clear.

I've only recently come to realize that what irritates me most about Mike's fantasy league is its gross lack of humanity. Radio isn't just about swapping frequencies, call letters, owners and formats. There are human beings who've spent careers helping to build these radio stations who likely may soon be out of work. I get it. I've been there. I've lost jobs and I've gained jobs with changes in ownership and format. But that doesn't dismiss that with your blanket "you could care less what happens" once iHeart takes over you've again shown a seemingly willful ignorance regarding the lives affected by the changes you so enjoy speculating about. Try spending a few hours in a radio station that has just fired a morning show or a program director. You'll find that game you so enjoy isn't quite as much fun as you seem to think.
Click to expand...

The speculation is over now that we found out who's getting Entercom's divestitures after the DOJ approved the merger. All what's left is the FCC approval and the shareholder vote, and the merger should close by next week.
 
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