0/5

Nine to buy Perth affiliate from WIN

Nine CEO David Gyngell is understood to have told WIN he will exercise his option to buy Nine Perth.

2013-07-03_1749Nine Entertainment Co. is set to purchase WIN’s Perth operations in a move that will give it TV stations in all mainland capital cities for the first time in its 57 year history.

The Australian Financial Review reported that chief executive David Gyngell informed WIN yesterday of his decision to exercise his option, in a deal worth between $180 million and $200 million.

Having paid $140 million for the Adelaide operations at the same time the pricey cricket deal was announced most observers expected Nine boss David Gyngell to put off the Perth acquisition.

The purchase of Adelaide and Perth is expected to put Nine’s reach at around 74% meaning Nine has been able to strike deals without the need for the reach rule to be changed.

The deal will put Nine on a more equal footing with Seven, which owns stations in all five major capital cities.

Last month, a parliamentary committee recommended the 75% reach rule – the last surviving piece of the Gillard government’s proposed media reforms – be scrapped.

Source: AdNews, Mediaweek

15 Responses

  1. I guess this means 9 Perth will soon have its picture quality un-WIN-ified. I’m sure several Perthite TVTonighters recall the huge plummet in PQ when WIN switched to its playout in the east.

  2. Jason, yes (at the risk of repeating myself), all of that is true. Hell, maybe Nine Co was willing to rent out their newly acquired studios in Adelaide & Perth for WIN News to continue? But I’m guessing they thought it would just be easier to axe them. As I replied to you on another current story, Nine are squishing WIN much more these days.

  3. @Stan – “…WIN have axed their local bulletins for regional SA & WA since they would’ve been homeless.” – Not necessarily. WIN regional news was done for a few years from NEW10, even though WIN had a substantial shareholding in STW9 at the time. The then directors (or at least the Chairwoman) were quite hostile towards B. Gordon.
    WIN’s regional SA bulletins were, and could be, done from SES8 and/or RTS.

  4. @Rob- Rupert Murdoch (News Corp) owned NWS9 from the beginning. In 1980 News sold NWS to NBN3 f(then owned by the Lamb family) or $19M. In 2002 NBN sold NWS to Southern Cross Bcasting. In 2007 SCB sold the station to WIN for $105M. WIN has sold it to Nine for $180M-$200M. Bond never had any interest in NWS9. Bond was the original licencee of STW9 In 1989 Bond sold STW9 to Sunraysia (STV8 Mildura) for $95M when he bought the Nine Network from Kerry Packer. Neither NWS9 or STW9 have ever been, financially, part of the “Nine Network” (TCN/GTV/QTQ).

  5. NWS Adelaide has never been a Nine owned and operated station until now. It was owned by NBN and then the Lamb family during the Bond period in the 1980s. It was sold to Southern Cross in 2002 and then WIN in 2007.

    Bond already owned STW Perth and QTQ Brisbane when he bought TCN Sydney and GTV Melbourne from Packer. He was later forced to sell STW due to cross-media ownership laws restricting the level of national reach. It was sold to Sunraysia Television who controlled it until 2007 when WIN bought it.

    So when Packer bought back Nine for a fraction of what he sold it for he got back TCN and GTV plus QTQ.

  6. Win TV will dye off soon. They are obviously setting up to nationalise state bulletins. Started in WA, as they scrapped the regionals, now in SA and also ACT. Next will be QLD regionals ie: Bundaberg, Rockhampton, Mackay or get video journos. How do TV journos get a start these days. It will come back to haunt the industry of quality journos down the track when they are forced to be producers in metros. No skills from regionals will be what it will become.

  7. Surely with the rate of migration to urban areas over rural areas that a current 74% will tip over the 75% fairly quickly?

    If a network has the main mainland capitals, the growth rate will make them hit the 75% sooon even if they aren’t expanding, no?

    What would happen in event of this?

  8. Lots of news coming out of the Nine & WIN camps in the last couple of days! Seems Nine are getting much bigger while WIN are getting smaller. I’m surprised WIN haven’t been interested in Nine Darwin & NBN. I’m sure Nine has a price in mind for those markets since they both don’t count towards five-capital city ratings.

    This also explains why WIN have axed their local bulletins for regional SA & WA since they would’ve been homeless. Still can’t tell whether WIN wants to merge with TEN or Nine. I guess we’ll know soon enough.

    However, Alvar is right. People out West (& Adelaide to a smaller degree) are obsessed with whatever Seven serves up there. I’m sure if Seven scheduled a test pattern it’d still rate higher than Nine. This won’t change a thing.

  9. Wow! Apollo Capital and Oaktree must have a endless pit of money. It was only a year ago that we were talking at the demise of Nine. This endless splash of money on League, cricket TV deals and now the Perth and Adelaide Tv stations seems to beheading the same way as the GFC.

  10. First time in 57 years? I was pretty sure that all the mainland capitals were owned by Bond when he bought out the network in the 80’s, when he went to later sell it back Packer was only interested in the eastern states leaving Adelaide and Perth out of the deal.

    Good luck to 9 though, they seem to be doing some good things overall at the moment, not sure they’ll topple 7 Perth’s number one position but yeah… 🙂

  11. Again Tasmania is left off. Nine should buy WIN and Seven buy Southern Cross and make the two divest themselves of TDT which should go under the TEN umbrella

  12. Will this make any difference to Nine’s performance in the west? Perth viewers still watch Seven religiously even against the might of The Voice and The Block. I personally can’t see this changing anytime soon.

Leave a Reply