Tribune Media, owner of Chicago’s independent WGN-TV and WGN America, will be acquired by its rival Nexstar for a deal totaling $6.4 billion.
The combined company would be the largest local television broadcaster in the country, according to Crain’s Chicago Business.
The deal, in which Nexstar Media Group will buy WGN owner Tribune Media for $4.1 billion and assume its debt, creates “uncertainty for the future of cable channel WGN America and radio station WGN-720,” the Chicago Tribune reported.
Shareholder and federal regulator approval are pending. The deal would be finalized at the end of 2019, the companies said in a joint statement. According to the Chicago Tribune, Nexstar owns 175 television stations including affiliates for NBC, CBS, ABC and Fox, reaching about 40 percent of U.S. households. Some of those overlap in a number of markets, meaning Nexstar will have to divest from some local TV stations, the companies’ joint statement said.
Tribune Media is what was left after Tribune Co. spun off its publishing division in 2014 into Tribune Publishing, according to the Chicago Tribune. The publishing arm owns a number of newspapers, including, since 2017, The New York Daily News.
“Nexstar has long viewed the acquisition of Tribune Media as a strategically, financially and operationally compelling opportunity that brings immediate value to shareholders of both companies,” Nexstar President, CEO and chairman Perry Sook said in the statement, adding that the deal “increases our audience reach by approximately 50 percent” and enables them to “serve 18 of the nation’s top 25 markets and 37 of the top 50 markets.”
