Tegna

CEO Dave Lougee said dropping Cox Reps to go in-house will increase automation of national spot sales and reduce the number of points of contact that the agencies have to deal with. “The response from the agencies to what we have announced has been tremendous,” he said. And he told analysts that retransmission consent revenues should account for about half of total revenues beginning in the 2020 cycle and continue to grow thereafter.

The increase to $537 million is powered by subscription revenues and an improvement in advertising and marketing services.

The Dispatch Broadcast Group executive will make the move once the sale of its stations to Tegna closes. He will be succeeded as president-GM of WTHR Indianapolis by Michael Brouder.

“This is a strategic change in how we go to market, and is aimed at taking advantage of our scale to deepen our relationships with national clients by embracing automation, and focusing our talented marketing executives on solutions that drive client results,” the station group said in a statement.

Broadcasters including Scripps, Tegna, CBS, Sinclair, Ion and Gray have been laying bigger bets in the multicasting business, acquiring some of the more popular diginets and partnering to develop new ones in a market showing signs of further expansion. CBS’s new diginet DABL, for instance, is bringing back the classic lifestyle programming of Martha Stewart and others in the fall.

It closes on the $77 million purchase of the 85% of the two diginets it didn’t own. Tegna taps Brian Weiss, former president and general manager of Cooper Media, as their president.

The agreement with CBS, Cox, Scripps, Fox and Tegna requires them to “terminate and refrain from sharing revenue pacing information and other competitively sensitive information.”

In addition to the NBC affiliate in Indianapolis and CBS affiliate in Columbus, Ohio, it’s also getting WBNS-AM-FM in Columbus.

Nearly 11 million television households across 11 markets are covered in the new multi-year deal.

Those looking for Justice’s decision on whether it has any antitrust issues with Tegna’s purchase of Nexstar spin-off stations will have to wait a little longer. That is because for the sixth business day in a row the Federal Trade Commission has issued no early termination notices on any deal, an unusual hiatus for such announcements.

Tegna, Tribune, Scripps, Fox and Graham are among a growing number of TV broadcasters who are exploring adding audio content and advertising platforms. A study from the Interactive Advertising Bureau and PricewaterhouseCoopers puts podcast ad revenues at $313.9 million in 2017, and projects that it will more than double, to $659 million, by next year.

But excluding political and estimated incremental Olympic and Super Bowl revenue, revenue was up 8% year-over-year, at the high-end of guidance.

It’s paying Cooper Media $77 million for the 85% of the two diginets it doesn’t already own. Brian Weiss, Cooper’s president-GM, will join Tegna and continue to run the two.

The Tegna-owned CBS affiliate began broadcasting from 43,000 square feet of space on Feb. 17. The two-and-a-half floors include a large, flexible studio space, two control rooms, edit suites and a multiplatform live desk where journalists produce for both KHOU’s on-air newscasts and its various digital platforms.

The spinoffs reflect Nexstar’s regulatory compliance plan to secure approvals for its Tribune Media deal. Tegna is buying 11 stations in eight markets and Scripps gets eight stations in seven markets.

Tegna’s over-the-top advertising unit Premion is using a new suite of blockchain-based technology from MadHive to prevent fraud, target campaign and verify ad delivery.

The $642 million total was driven by an increase of $130 million in political ad revenue plus $40 million more in subscription revenue.

The broadcaster will pay a dividend of 7 cents per share on April 1 to stockholders of record as of the close of business on March 8.

Tim Thomas will lead KWES Midland-Odessa, while Paul Bergen is promoted to oversee KBMT Beaumont.

Tegna, Hearst and EW Scripps are all planning on submitting final offers for Cox Media Group’s 14 TV stations at the end of January, according to people familiar with the matter. Final bids are due by Jan. 30, said the people, who asked not to be named because the process is private. A deal could fetch more than $2 billion, and possibly close to $3 billion, the people said.

The new deal reups WFAA Dallas; KXTV Sacramento, Calif.; KVUE Austin, Texas; WVEC Norfolk, Va.; WZZM Grand Rapids, Mich.; WJXX Jacksonville, Fla.; WHAS Louisville, Ky.; KIII Corpus Christi, Texas; and KBMT Beaumont, Texas.

It closes on the $105 million purchase from Gray Television of the CBS affiliate in Toledo and the NBC affiliate in Midland-Odessa, Texas.

Tegna television stations in three markets — Washington, D.C. (WUSA-CBS), Norfolk, Va. (WVEC-ABC) and Buffalo, N.Y. (WGRZ-NBC) — went dark to Verizon Communications Fios TV customers on Monday at 5 p.m. ET, after the parties failed to reach a retransmission consent agreement.

Premion, the seller of OTT advertising inventory for a number of platforms, says it is refunding money to advertisers for specific campaigns that ran during 2018 due to “system issues.” Premion, owned by Tegna, says its Premium Audience Selects segments have “not been delivered correctly,” and that it affects up to 17% of Premion total revenue.

Tegna and Dish Network said they reached a multi-year carriage agreement just hours after Tegna’s stations went dark to Dish subscribers Saturday morning. The companies said that the stations’ signals will be restored to the Dish lineup immediately.

The Tegna VP also oversees the groups other seven stations in Texas. He succeeds the retiring Dan Robbins.

Tegna President-CEO Dave Lougee says that ad category is destined to join subscription revenue as a reliable income stream that will inoculate the company from the ups and downs of the economy as a whole.

The $539 million total was attributed to that higher political ad revenue plus $30 million growth in subscription revenue.