The American Broadcasting Company (ABC) is an American television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948. As one of the Big Three television networks, its programming has contributed to American popular culture.
Corporate headquarters is in the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City,[1] while programming offices are in Burbank, California adjacent to the Walt Disney Studios and the corporate headquarters of The Walt Disney Company.
The formal name of the operation is American Broadcasting Companies, Inc., and that name appears on copyright notices for its in-house network productions and on all official documents of the company, including paychecks and contracts. A separate entity named ABC Inc., formerly Capital Cities/ABC Inc., is that firm's direct parent company, and that company is owned in turn by Disney. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Alphabet Network", due to the letters "ABC" being the first three letters of the Latin alphabet, in order.
Young Broadcasting Inc. owns and operates 10 television stations in geographically diverse markets and a national television sales representation firm, Adam Young Inc. Five of the stations are affiliated with American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. (ABC), three are affiliated with CBS Inc. (CBS), one is affiliated with National Broadcasting Company, Inc. (NBC), and one is affiliated with MyNetworkTV. Each of the Company's stations is owned and operated by a direct or indirect subsidiary. One station is located in the West region (KRON-San Francisco, California), four stations are located in the Midwest region (WBAY-Green Bay, Wisconsin, KWQC-Quad Cities, KELO-Sioux Falls, South Dakota and WLNS-Lansing, Michigan), four stations are located in the Southeast region (WKRN-Nashville, Tennessee, WRIC-Richmond, Virginia, WATE-Knoxville, Tennessee, and KLFY-Lafayette, Louisiana), and one station is located in the Northeast region (WTEN-Albany, New York). On February 13, 2009, the Company and all of its subsidiaries filed voluntary petitions for relief under the provisions of Chapter 11 of Title 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York.
WKRN, Nashville, Tennessee
WKRN is affiliated with ABC. There are six reportable stations in the designated market area (DMA). The station's syndicated programs include The Doctors, Sex and the City, Martha Stewart Show, Live with Regis and Kelly, and Wheel of Fortune. The station is also home to the Tennessee Titans pre-season games and coach's show. WKRN is also the Nashville station for the Tennessee Lottery, hosting 3 to 4 daily drawings.
WTEN, Albany, New York
WTEN is affiliated with ABC. WTEN also has a satellite station, WCDC-TV Channel 19, located in Adams, Massachusetts. The stations syndicated programming includes Wheel Of Fortune, Jeopardy, and The Doctors.
WATE, Knoxville, Tennessee
WATE is affiliated with ABC. The station's syndicated programming includes Oprah, Judge Judy, Inside Edition, The Insider and Rachel Ray. WATE-TV's station focus is its news product. The station is also research-focused and seeks to provide hard news, investigative reporting and breaking news, every day. The station's other priority is weather.
WRIC, Richmond, Virginia
WRIC is affiliated with ABC. The station's syndicated programming includes Oprah, Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy. WRIC produces 28.5 hours of local news per week in addition to ABC network and syndicated programming.
WBAY, Green Bay, Wisconsin
WBAY is affiliated with ABC. The station's syndicated programming includes Martha Stewart Show, Dr. Phil, Millionaire, The Insider, and Sex and the City. The station also produces a local football show called Tuesday Night Touchback, which is broadcast live every week during the season. The station's primary focus is local news. The station broadcasts 29 hours of local news each week, and most newscasts win their time periods. WBAY TV also broadcasts around the clock local weather channel Stormcenter 2 24/7 and the Retro Television Network through its digital signal, as well as through cable channels.
KWQC, Quad Cities
KWQC is affiliated with NBC. The station's syndicated programming includes Millionaire, Rachel Ray, Jeopardy, and Wheel of Fortune. KWQC also broadcasts a around the clock local weather channel KWQC-TV6 First Alert 24/7. KWQC delivers this weather channel through its digital signal, as well as through multiple cable outlets.
WLNS, Lansing, Michigan
WLNS is affiliated with the CBS Network. Each week the station broadcasts over 20 hours of local news, including two hours from 5am to 7am weekdays, plus the midday newscast.
KELO, Sioux Falls, South Dakota
KELO is affiliated with CBS. KELO include KDLO and KPLO only. KELO added satellite station KDLO, Channel 3, in Florence, South Dakota to serve the northern South Dakota area, and added satellite station KPLO, Channel 6, in Reliance, South Dakota, to serve the central South Dakota area.
KLFY, Lafayette, Louisiana
KLFY is affiliated with CBS. KLFY is one of the network-affiliated VHF stations serving the Lafayette Market. The station's syndicated programs include Entertainment Tonight, Inside Edition, Dr. Phil, Millionaire, Regis and Kelly and Judge Judy.
KRON, San Francisco, California
The Company has acquired KRON Channel 4 from The Chronicle Publishing Company. KRON is a VHF television station in the San Francisco Bay Area. KRON has also launched programs, such as Bay Area Bargains and Bay Area Living.
With nine stations to its name, Young Broadcasting generated $122 million in revenues in 1995, but the company continued to lose money. A substantial amount of the cash flow generated by the stations was consumed by the company's burdensome debt service, which hamstrung Young's efforts to produce a profit. The massive debt taken on by the company, which totaled roughly $400 million by June 1996, did not spoil Young's appetite for further acquisitions, however. He struck again in April 1996, acquiring NBC affiliate KWQC, located in Davenport, Iowa, from Broad Street Television. The following month, the company acquired the CBS affiliate KELO in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Both acquisitions paled against Young's third acquisition of the year, a mammoth deal that by far outstripped any acquisition made during the company's first decade of existence. Once the transaction was concluded, Young Broadcasting's annual revenues nearly doubled.
The acquisition prompted Forbes to refer to Young as 'a crapshooter' in the magazine's July 15, 1996 issue. One broadcasting analyst remarked, 'Young is betting the ranch,' in the August 19, 1996 issue of Broadcasting & Cable, referring to the deal that again drew national attention toward Young. The television station in question was KCAL, owned by Walt Disney Company. Serving the Los Angeles market, KCAL was one of the few viable major-market independent stations in the nation, a valuable prize that attracted a host of suitors after Disney announced it was divesting the property. To the surprise of many industry observers, Young entered into the auction for KCAL, engaging in a bidding war that he ultimately won. Young outbid rivals such as Granite Broadcasting, Argyle Communications, and a group of investors led by basketball star Magic Johnson, agreeing to pay $368 million for the independent station.
The acquisition of KCAL represented a major move on Young's part, adding the largest independent station in the second largest television market in terms of population. In the wake of the acquisition, which was completed in December 1996, Young was forced to restructure KCAL. The station had been used by Disney to display the entertainment company's sports and promotion efforts, which required an extravagant budget. 'The way Disney ran the station and the way any of the groups that were bidding would run it are very different,' Young explained in a May 20, 1996 interview with MEDIAWEEK. 'They [Disney] were building their image,' he added, 'spending so many millions of dollars on things like promotion, that there are significant savings just from cutting costs on a line-by-line basis.' Young planned to reduce the station's annual expenses by $21 million and to renegotiate programming contracts for an additional savings of nearly $12 million, but there was no escaping the considerable cost of the acquisition. Much of the money required to complete the purchase was borrowed, lifting the company's debt load to more than $650 million as it entered the late 1990s.
Young's penchant for deal-making took a different twist not long after the purchase of KCAL was completed. In 1998, the company was put up for sale, offered at an estimated price of $1.9 billion. By September 1998, however, the prospect of a sale had been formally quashed. In the aftermath of a downturn suffered by the country's financial markets, the company took itself off the auction block, citing deteriorating market conditions as the reason for withdrawing from the sale. Young Broadcasting's chief financial officer announced that management believed any buyer would face extreme difficulty arranging the financing to complete the deal, but industry analysts offered another reason. Most of the bidders, the pundits claimed, had withdrawn their interest before the market downturn, citing instead the substantial costs required to make KCAL a competitive and profitable station. Although Young Broadcasting had canceled plans for its sale, the company exited 1998 exploring other strategic alternatives, including a possible merger with another television company.
KRON Acquisition: 2000
For Young Broadcasting, the 1990s ended with another spectacular transaction concluded on the acquisition front. In December 1999, Young eclipsed the bravado of the KCAL acquisition by winning the auction for KRON, the NBC affiliate in San Francisco. Young paid $737 million for the station, winning a bidding war against NBC that soon erupted into a contentious battle of wills. After losing the auction, NBC demanded Young Broadcasting pay a $10 million annual fee to maintain its affiliation with the network. Young refused, which meant KRON was scheduled to become an independent station when its contract with NBC expired on December 31, 2001. Young Broadcasting's stock plunged 45 percent after NBC announced it was handing its network affiliation to San Jose-based KNTV, but Young and his management team remained unruffled. Industry observers speculated that Young was interested in selling the company, a supposition that Young himself promoted. 'As this industry may continue to consolidate, it's nice having the prettiest girls at the dance,' Young said in a February 12, 2001 interview with Electronic Media, referring to KCAL and KRON.
As Young Broadcasting entered the 21st century, the fate of the company was a topic of considerable debate. Much of the attention focused on KRON's expected new role as an independent and on the station's need to replace the network programming it had relied on for years. There was a possibility that the relationship between KRON and NBC could be restored, a prospect that Young hinted at. The larger question about the company's future centered on Young's repeated claims that he was willing to sell the company. Analysts in early 2001 were expecting such a move, but no one could accurately predict what Young's next deal might be.
Principal Subsidiaries: Young Broadcasting of Louisiana, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Lansing, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of La Crosse, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Albany, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Nashville, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Green Bay, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Knoxville, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Richmond, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Davenport, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Sioux Falls, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Rapid City, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Los Angeles, Inc.; YBT, Inc.; LAT, Inc.; YBK, Inc.; Fidelity Television, Inc.; WKRN, G.P.; KLFY, L.P.; WATE, G.P.; Adam Young Inc.
Principal Competitors: Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc.; Hubbard Broadcasting Inc.; Hearst-Argyle Television, Inc.; Granite Broadcasting Corporation.
OVERALL
Beta: 1.94
Market Cap (Mil.): $0.03
Shares Outstanding (Mil.): 21.84
Annual Dividend: --
Yield (%): --
FINANCIALS
YBTVQ.PK Industry Sector
P/E (TTM): -- 199.02 13.70
EPS (TTM): -368.38 -- --
ROI: -579.56 3.77 1.27
ROE: -- 6.72 2.12
Statistics:
Public Company
Incorporated: 1986
Employees: 2,000
Sales: $280.65 million (1999)
Stock Exchanges: NASDAQ
Ticker Symbol: YBTVA
NAIC: 51312 Television Broadcasting
Key Dates:
1986: Young Broadcasting is formed; company acquires two CBS television affiliates, WLNS and WKBT.
1988: CBS affiliate KLFY and NBC affiliate WTVO are acquired.
1989: Two ABC affiliates, WTEN and WKRN, are acquired.
1992: A deal to acquire five television stations is scuttled.
1994: Young Broadcasting debuts as a publicly traded company.
1996: Los Angeles-based independent station KCAL is acquired for $368 million.
2000: KRON, an NBC affiliate based in San Francisco, is acquired for $737 million.
Name Age Since Current Position
Young, Vincent 59 Chairman of the Board, Chief Executive Officer
McDermott, Deborah 52 2004 President, Director
Morgan, James 58 1998 Chief Financial Officer, Executive Vice President, Secretary, Director
Hickey, Alfred 70 1994 Director
Lowe, Richard 55 2001 Director
Murray, Reid 48 2004 Director
Amling, Jeffrey 2008 Director
Address:
599 Lexington Avenue
New York, New York 10022
U.S.A.
Corporate headquarters is in the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City,[1] while programming offices are in Burbank, California adjacent to the Walt Disney Studios and the corporate headquarters of The Walt Disney Company.
The formal name of the operation is American Broadcasting Companies, Inc., and that name appears on copyright notices for its in-house network productions and on all official documents of the company, including paychecks and contracts. A separate entity named ABC Inc., formerly Capital Cities/ABC Inc., is that firm's direct parent company, and that company is owned in turn by Disney. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Alphabet Network", due to the letters "ABC" being the first three letters of the Latin alphabet, in order.
Young Broadcasting Inc. owns and operates 10 television stations in geographically diverse markets and a national television sales representation firm, Adam Young Inc. Five of the stations are affiliated with American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. (ABC), three are affiliated with CBS Inc. (CBS), one is affiliated with National Broadcasting Company, Inc. (NBC), and one is affiliated with MyNetworkTV. Each of the Company's stations is owned and operated by a direct or indirect subsidiary. One station is located in the West region (KRON-San Francisco, California), four stations are located in the Midwest region (WBAY-Green Bay, Wisconsin, KWQC-Quad Cities, KELO-Sioux Falls, South Dakota and WLNS-Lansing, Michigan), four stations are located in the Southeast region (WKRN-Nashville, Tennessee, WRIC-Richmond, Virginia, WATE-Knoxville, Tennessee, and KLFY-Lafayette, Louisiana), and one station is located in the Northeast region (WTEN-Albany, New York). On February 13, 2009, the Company and all of its subsidiaries filed voluntary petitions for relief under the provisions of Chapter 11 of Title 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York.
WKRN, Nashville, Tennessee
WKRN is affiliated with ABC. There are six reportable stations in the designated market area (DMA). The station's syndicated programs include The Doctors, Sex and the City, Martha Stewart Show, Live with Regis and Kelly, and Wheel of Fortune. The station is also home to the Tennessee Titans pre-season games and coach's show. WKRN is also the Nashville station for the Tennessee Lottery, hosting 3 to 4 daily drawings.
WTEN, Albany, New York
WTEN is affiliated with ABC. WTEN also has a satellite station, WCDC-TV Channel 19, located in Adams, Massachusetts. The stations syndicated programming includes Wheel Of Fortune, Jeopardy, and The Doctors.
WATE, Knoxville, Tennessee
WATE is affiliated with ABC. The station's syndicated programming includes Oprah, Judge Judy, Inside Edition, The Insider and Rachel Ray. WATE-TV's station focus is its news product. The station is also research-focused and seeks to provide hard news, investigative reporting and breaking news, every day. The station's other priority is weather.
WRIC, Richmond, Virginia
WRIC is affiliated with ABC. The station's syndicated programming includes Oprah, Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy. WRIC produces 28.5 hours of local news per week in addition to ABC network and syndicated programming.
WBAY, Green Bay, Wisconsin
WBAY is affiliated with ABC. The station's syndicated programming includes Martha Stewart Show, Dr. Phil, Millionaire, The Insider, and Sex and the City. The station also produces a local football show called Tuesday Night Touchback, which is broadcast live every week during the season. The station's primary focus is local news. The station broadcasts 29 hours of local news each week, and most newscasts win their time periods. WBAY TV also broadcasts around the clock local weather channel Stormcenter 2 24/7 and the Retro Television Network through its digital signal, as well as through cable channels.
KWQC, Quad Cities
KWQC is affiliated with NBC. The station's syndicated programming includes Millionaire, Rachel Ray, Jeopardy, and Wheel of Fortune. KWQC also broadcasts a around the clock local weather channel KWQC-TV6 First Alert 24/7. KWQC delivers this weather channel through its digital signal, as well as through multiple cable outlets.
WLNS, Lansing, Michigan
WLNS is affiliated with the CBS Network. Each week the station broadcasts over 20 hours of local news, including two hours from 5am to 7am weekdays, plus the midday newscast.
KELO, Sioux Falls, South Dakota
KELO is affiliated with CBS. KELO include KDLO and KPLO only. KELO added satellite station KDLO, Channel 3, in Florence, South Dakota to serve the northern South Dakota area, and added satellite station KPLO, Channel 6, in Reliance, South Dakota, to serve the central South Dakota area.
KLFY, Lafayette, Louisiana
KLFY is affiliated with CBS. KLFY is one of the network-affiliated VHF stations serving the Lafayette Market. The station's syndicated programs include Entertainment Tonight, Inside Edition, Dr. Phil, Millionaire, Regis and Kelly and Judge Judy.
KRON, San Francisco, California
The Company has acquired KRON Channel 4 from The Chronicle Publishing Company. KRON is a VHF television station in the San Francisco Bay Area. KRON has also launched programs, such as Bay Area Bargains and Bay Area Living.
With nine stations to its name, Young Broadcasting generated $122 million in revenues in 1995, but the company continued to lose money. A substantial amount of the cash flow generated by the stations was consumed by the company's burdensome debt service, which hamstrung Young's efforts to produce a profit. The massive debt taken on by the company, which totaled roughly $400 million by June 1996, did not spoil Young's appetite for further acquisitions, however. He struck again in April 1996, acquiring NBC affiliate KWQC, located in Davenport, Iowa, from Broad Street Television. The following month, the company acquired the CBS affiliate KELO in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Both acquisitions paled against Young's third acquisition of the year, a mammoth deal that by far outstripped any acquisition made during the company's first decade of existence. Once the transaction was concluded, Young Broadcasting's annual revenues nearly doubled.
The acquisition prompted Forbes to refer to Young as 'a crapshooter' in the magazine's July 15, 1996 issue. One broadcasting analyst remarked, 'Young is betting the ranch,' in the August 19, 1996 issue of Broadcasting & Cable, referring to the deal that again drew national attention toward Young. The television station in question was KCAL, owned by Walt Disney Company. Serving the Los Angeles market, KCAL was one of the few viable major-market independent stations in the nation, a valuable prize that attracted a host of suitors after Disney announced it was divesting the property. To the surprise of many industry observers, Young entered into the auction for KCAL, engaging in a bidding war that he ultimately won. Young outbid rivals such as Granite Broadcasting, Argyle Communications, and a group of investors led by basketball star Magic Johnson, agreeing to pay $368 million for the independent station.
The acquisition of KCAL represented a major move on Young's part, adding the largest independent station in the second largest television market in terms of population. In the wake of the acquisition, which was completed in December 1996, Young was forced to restructure KCAL. The station had been used by Disney to display the entertainment company's sports and promotion efforts, which required an extravagant budget. 'The way Disney ran the station and the way any of the groups that were bidding would run it are very different,' Young explained in a May 20, 1996 interview with MEDIAWEEK. 'They [Disney] were building their image,' he added, 'spending so many millions of dollars on things like promotion, that there are significant savings just from cutting costs on a line-by-line basis.' Young planned to reduce the station's annual expenses by $21 million and to renegotiate programming contracts for an additional savings of nearly $12 million, but there was no escaping the considerable cost of the acquisition. Much of the money required to complete the purchase was borrowed, lifting the company's debt load to more than $650 million as it entered the late 1990s.
Young's penchant for deal-making took a different twist not long after the purchase of KCAL was completed. In 1998, the company was put up for sale, offered at an estimated price of $1.9 billion. By September 1998, however, the prospect of a sale had been formally quashed. In the aftermath of a downturn suffered by the country's financial markets, the company took itself off the auction block, citing deteriorating market conditions as the reason for withdrawing from the sale. Young Broadcasting's chief financial officer announced that management believed any buyer would face extreme difficulty arranging the financing to complete the deal, but industry analysts offered another reason. Most of the bidders, the pundits claimed, had withdrawn their interest before the market downturn, citing instead the substantial costs required to make KCAL a competitive and profitable station. Although Young Broadcasting had canceled plans for its sale, the company exited 1998 exploring other strategic alternatives, including a possible merger with another television company.
KRON Acquisition: 2000
For Young Broadcasting, the 1990s ended with another spectacular transaction concluded on the acquisition front. In December 1999, Young eclipsed the bravado of the KCAL acquisition by winning the auction for KRON, the NBC affiliate in San Francisco. Young paid $737 million for the station, winning a bidding war against NBC that soon erupted into a contentious battle of wills. After losing the auction, NBC demanded Young Broadcasting pay a $10 million annual fee to maintain its affiliation with the network. Young refused, which meant KRON was scheduled to become an independent station when its contract with NBC expired on December 31, 2001. Young Broadcasting's stock plunged 45 percent after NBC announced it was handing its network affiliation to San Jose-based KNTV, but Young and his management team remained unruffled. Industry observers speculated that Young was interested in selling the company, a supposition that Young himself promoted. 'As this industry may continue to consolidate, it's nice having the prettiest girls at the dance,' Young said in a February 12, 2001 interview with Electronic Media, referring to KCAL and KRON.
As Young Broadcasting entered the 21st century, the fate of the company was a topic of considerable debate. Much of the attention focused on KRON's expected new role as an independent and on the station's need to replace the network programming it had relied on for years. There was a possibility that the relationship between KRON and NBC could be restored, a prospect that Young hinted at. The larger question about the company's future centered on Young's repeated claims that he was willing to sell the company. Analysts in early 2001 were expecting such a move, but no one could accurately predict what Young's next deal might be.
Principal Subsidiaries: Young Broadcasting of Louisiana, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Lansing, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of La Crosse, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Albany, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Nashville, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Green Bay, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Knoxville, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Richmond, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Davenport, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Sioux Falls, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Rapid City, Inc.; Young Broadcasting of Los Angeles, Inc.; YBT, Inc.; LAT, Inc.; YBK, Inc.; Fidelity Television, Inc.; WKRN, G.P.; KLFY, L.P.; WATE, G.P.; Adam Young Inc.
Principal Competitors: Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc.; Hubbard Broadcasting Inc.; Hearst-Argyle Television, Inc.; Granite Broadcasting Corporation.
OVERALL
Beta: 1.94
Market Cap (Mil.): $0.03
Shares Outstanding (Mil.): 21.84
Annual Dividend: --
Yield (%): --
FINANCIALS
YBTVQ.PK Industry Sector
P/E (TTM): -- 199.02 13.70
EPS (TTM): -368.38 -- --
ROI: -579.56 3.77 1.27
ROE: -- 6.72 2.12
Statistics:
Public Company
Incorporated: 1986
Employees: 2,000
Sales: $280.65 million (1999)
Stock Exchanges: NASDAQ
Ticker Symbol: YBTVA
NAIC: 51312 Television Broadcasting
Key Dates:
1986: Young Broadcasting is formed; company acquires two CBS television affiliates, WLNS and WKBT.
1988: CBS affiliate KLFY and NBC affiliate WTVO are acquired.
1989: Two ABC affiliates, WTEN and WKRN, are acquired.
1992: A deal to acquire five television stations is scuttled.
1994: Young Broadcasting debuts as a publicly traded company.
1996: Los Angeles-based independent station KCAL is acquired for $368 million.
2000: KRON, an NBC affiliate based in San Francisco, is acquired for $737 million.
Name Age Since Current Position
Young, Vincent 59 Chairman of the Board, Chief Executive Officer
McDermott, Deborah 52 2004 President, Director
Morgan, James 58 1998 Chief Financial Officer, Executive Vice President, Secretary, Director
Hickey, Alfred 70 1994 Director
Lowe, Richard 55 2001 Director
Murray, Reid 48 2004 Director
Amling, Jeffrey 2008 Director
Address:
599 Lexington Avenue
New York, New York 10022
U.S.A.