Sinclair Broadcast Group

The long-term deal expands the TV station group’s ratings contract to all 172 stations in 81 markets.

Executives from major U.S. TV broadcasters like Sinclair Broadcast Group, CBS and Gray Television say their respective companies will likely participate in the FCC’s upcoming incentive auction of TV broadcasters’ 600 MHz spectrum — to varying degrees. Executives from other publicly held TV broadcasters say they will take a wait-and-see approach.

Rentrak boosted its contract with Sinclair Broadcast Group on Wednesday, adding 164 TV stations to its roster of stations measured. With this deal Rentrak extends its reach to 615 stations, so it now tracks nearly one-third of all the nation’s TV stations.

The broadcast group pays $31.25 million to add to its portfolio the Nebraska stations KFXL Lincoln, KHGI Kearney, KHGI-LD O’Neill, KWNB-LD Hayes Center, KWNB-LD McCook and KHGI-CD North Platte.

The increase to $497.4 million is driven by strong advertising and a 34% increase in digital revenue.

Under its new programming COO, the station group is developing shows in virtually every genre of unscripted programming that it will attempt to syndicate to other broadcasters in an effort to “control costs and develop new revenue streams,” Hasson says.

Sinclair Broadcast Group is starting a new science fiction network along with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer at the end of the month. Comet, will air MGM TV programming including The Outer Limits, Dead Like Me and several iterations of the Stargate franchise. It will also have movies from the MGM vault as well, including Moonraker and The Terminator.

Arthur Hasson will oversee all programming as COO, Sinclair Programming. Bill Butler, VP of programming and promotion, becomes SVP of promotion and corporate marketing in the reorganization.

Combining broadcast, Internet and social media technologies, a new news segment, Connect to Congress, offers Sinclair’s local market viewers “new ways to get answers to questions from their members of Congress.

Full Measure is the first-ever program produced by the Sinclair Television Group, which owns 162 TV stations, covering 38% of the nation’s TV homes. Most stations will air it at 9:30 a.m. Sundays, or later in the morning in some markets where Sinclair owns more than one station. The program’s mission is accountability reporting and investigations. Sinclair and former CBS News reporter Sharyl Attkisson say Full Measure will come without a political agenda, although shared history makes that a pertinent question.

Sinclair’s American Sports Network will air live collegiate hockey games from Hockey East, the National Collegiate Hockey Conference, ECAC Hockey and the Western Collegiate Hockey Association, Friday nights on Sinclair TV stations and other ASN broadcast and cable affiliates around the country.

The station group has had talks with the private equity groups that control the cable network with a 35-million home reach, according to the financial paper. Sources peg the price at more than $500 million.

The ATSC 3.0 proponent receives FCC approval to operate a full-power, single frequency network test platform in Washington and Baltimore on ch. 43. It will broadcast a range of next-gen services that include fixed, portable and mobile capabilities to provide real-time assessments of the new Internet protocol-based standard currently being reviewed by the Advanced Television Systems Committee. 

Kevin Cotlove, Ryan Moore and Ben Miller all add VP stripes to their resumes, reporting to Rob Weisbord, COO of Sinclair Digital.

In major milestone, a key subcommittee adopts a transmission system reflecting a compromise among the major system proponents, including Samsung, LG Electronics and Sinclair Broadcast Group-backed ONE Media. It’s expected to be issued as a candidate standard within the next several weeks. Audio becomes the new sticking point.

Sinclair Broadcast Group shot down claims by the FCC that the agency’s intervention was the reason that Dish and Sinclair finally hammered out a new retransmission consent agreement.

Shortly after FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler ordered the Media Bureau to intervene in the blackout, the broadcaster and satellite provider agreed on terms of a new contract.

After failing to come to a new retransmission consent agreement, 129 Sinclair Broadcast Group stations in 79 markets went dark on Dish Network Tuesday, affecting 5 million Dish customers. In response to the complaint filed by Dish requesting injunctive relief, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler directed the Media Bureau to convene an emergency meeting to bring back the local stations on Dish. Both parties have until midnight Wednesday to file their views.

Nine days after Sinclair Broadcast Group and Dish Network extended their deadline for a retransmission agreement, the company’s 150-plus stations are gone from the satcaster in 79 markets nationwide. Maryland-based Sinclair’s stations include affiliates of ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox and the CW, and with the fall TV season approaching — and the NFL regular season a mere 16 days away — the stakes are high. Sinclair last month re-upped is affiliate deal with CBS, which carries Sunday pro football games.

Dish Network and Sinclair Broadcast Group agreed on a short-term retransmission contract extension, easing a standoff between the companies that threatened customer access to 153 Sinclair stations in 79 markets nationwide.

The TV station group says that a $2 billion evaluation doesn’t necessarily mean it intends to sell any. It’s also in discussions over channel sharing.

Strong advertising and digital revenue, plus higher retransmission consent money are key drivers.

The station group’s new half-hour investigative series, Full Measure With Sharyl Attkisson, will launch Oct. 4.

The station group reups CBS stations in 16 markets as well as CW affiliates in 23 DMAs.

The Pearl group of nine major station groups and Sinclair have agreed to work with the consumer electronics giant over the next 18 months to develop and test new features and services that will support broadcasters’ evolving business models for the next-generation broadcast TV standard.

A federal appeals court says that an NAB-Sinclair Broadcast Group challenge filed last year objecting to portions of the FCC’s spectrum auction plans is without merit.

ZypMedia, the programmatic media-buying platform for local advertising formerly known as ExtendTV, on Wednesday announced it has closed a $4.4 million Series B round of funding led by Sinclair Broadcast Group. Sinclair has also struck a partnership with ZypMedia to use its programmatic media-buying platform for digital advertising in local markets.

Jerald Fritz of ONE Media says if broadcasters can submit a petition to the commission this summer, the FCC may be able to conduct a rulemaking and give its blessing late this year or early next. That means TV stations could be on the air with the standard sometime in 2017, he adds.

Sinclair will air UNCF An Evening of Stars in all of its 78 television markets, reaching almost 40% of the country, beginning on June 6. In addition, in each of Sinclair’s news markets where there is a historically black college or university (HBCU), Sinclair will produce a news feature on that school leading up to the show. iHeartMedia will begin promoting Sinclair’s broadcast of the UNCF television show on 156 of its radio stations in Sinclair’s markets starting the week of June 1.

The new website is designed to serve advertisers, investors, employment candidates and business partners/vendors. Later this year, the company’s stations will all get site redesigns.

CEO David Smith: “By July, maybe August, we should know essentially what the future platform will look like, what business platforms we can roll off that will look like. It’s the first time in 20 years I’ve seen the industry line up to control its own destiny.”

Strong core advertising and retransmission consent money plus higher digital revenue are key drivers.

The former CBS correspondent will host a half-hour Sunday news program on the group’s network affiliates that will be a blend of investigative and political journalism, with a focus on accountability.

The station group sees ad sales in such programming as one key to generating bigger multicast revenue.

In partnership with Visible World, the broadcast group is able to aggregate impressions across its 161 stations and automatically target specific local broadcast audiences.

Sinclair Digital Ventures “will focus on companies with products or services that support and expand Sinclair’s digital capabilities and non-linear footprint.” It will be overseen by David Amy, Sinclair’s COO; Chris Ripley, Sinclair’s CFO; and Rob Weisbord, COO of Sinclair Digital Group.