Gray Television

Gray Television, Inc.

Type	Public
Traded as	NYSE: GTN
Industry	Broadcast television
Founded	1946
Headquarters	Atlanta, Georgia, Albany, Georgia
Area served	United States (Nationwide)
Key people	Hilton Howell (President)
Products	41 terrestrial TV stations
Revenue	$332.1 million USD (2006)
Number of employees	2,086
Website	www.gray.tv

Gray Television, Inc. is a communications company headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, with administrative offices in Albany, Georgia. Established in 1946 by James Harrison Gray, a naturalized New Englander who moved to Southwest Georgia, he formed Gray Communications System (now Gray Television) which has grown since 1993 into a modern-day, successful television group based out of Atlanta, Georgia through a series of acquisitions ranging from 1993-2014.

Gray Television currently owns 41 television stations serving 30 mainly mid-size and small-size media markets. (The highest-ranked market that Gray serves is Knoxville, Tennessee, the 59th ranked market in 2008.) Three of the stations are affiliated with Fox, 8 are with ABC, 10 are with NBC, one is with Antenna TV, and 19 are affiliated with CBS.

The company’'s 45 secondary channels are affiliated with the major broadcast networks: Fox, ABC, NBC, CBS, and the two minor networks The CW, MyNetworkTV; along with the several new syndicated digital sub-channels that are offered to various local TV stations across the country: This TV, Me-TV, and Antenna TV. In addition, it broadcast 9 local news/weather secondary digital sub-channels.

The combined Station Group has 21 stations ranked #1 in local news audience and 21 stations ranked #1 in overall audience within their respective markets based on the results of the average of the Nielsen February, May, and July and 2008 ratings reports. The combined TV Station Group reached approximately 6.1% of the total U.S.A.'s TV households.

History

In 2006, the Company spun off its five daily newspapers and wireless messaging business into the newly formed Triple Crown Media, which subsequently merged with Host Communications.

On July 30, 2009, Gray Television was awarded a contract to manage seven Young Broadcasting-owned stations. Through December 31, 2012, Gray will earn $2.2 million and an opportunity to earn additional specified incentive fees if certain performance targets are exceeded.^[1][2][3]

On November 4, 2013, Gray Television announced that it would purchase Yellowstone Holdings for $23 million, adding local stations: KGNS-TV, KGWN, KCWY, and KCHY-LP.^[4] Three weeks later, on November 20, Gray announced it would purchase Hoak Media and Parker Broadcasting for $335 million, and North Dakota's Fox affiliate KNDX/KXND for $7.5 million. In part of the deal, stations KAQY, KHAS-TV, and KXJB, was proposed to be sold to Excalibur Broadcasting and operated by Gray under a "local marketing agreements".^[5] On December 19, it was announced that stations KREX-TV and WMBB will be sold to Nexstar Broadcasting Group, while KFQX will be sold to Mission Broadcasting.^[6] On March 25, 2014, Prime Cities Broadcasting, owner of KNDX/KXND, requested that the FCC dismiss the sale of KNDX/KXND to Excalibur.^[7]

The sale was completed on June 13, 2014. However, some stations were forced to go off the air and programming being move to a multicast stream on adjacent channels, due to some stations unable to receive regulatory approval, after FCC recent ruling on joint sales agreements. Those silent stations will then be sold off to minority interest, pending FCC approval.^[8][9]

On July 24, 2014, SJL Broadcasting announced that it would sell WJRT-TV, WTVG and WT05 to Gray, for $128 million.^[10][11] The sale was completed on September 15.^[12]

Television stations owned and operated by Gray Television

(Stations arranged alphabetically by state and by city of license).

Notes:

• (++) – Indicates a station previously owned by Benedek Broadcasting. All stations except for KGWN/KSTF, were acquired by Gray in 2002.
• (¤¤) – Indicates a station owned by Hoak Media, prior to its acquisition by Gray in 2014.

Former Gray stations

Notes:

• ¹ Former flagship station
• ² Owned by Parker Broadcasting, Gray operated KAQY & KXJB under a shared services agreement, with sister stations KNOE & KVLY, respectively.
• ³ Owned by Excalibur Broadcasting, Gray operated KJCT under a Local marketing agreement, with sister station, KKCO.
• ⁴ TV-3 Winchester was Winchester, Virginia's cable-only ABC affiliate. The station is a joint operation of WHSV-TV of Harrisonburg, Virginia, and Shenandoah University, and appeared on cable systems located only in the northern Shenandoah Valley counties. The channel was also simulcasted on WHSV-DT3.

Management of Young Broadcasting stations

On July 22, 2009, a New York bankruptcy judge approved a plan transferring ownership of Young Broadcasting and its stations to the company's secured lenders. The plan included Gray Television coming in as an outside party and advise on operations of Young-owned stations in seven markets through December 2012. (The new Young Broadcasting still has final word on the stations' operations, including programming and personnel.)^[1][3]

The Young-owned stations managed by Gray Television include:

• WKRN-TV in Nashville, Tennessee
• WTEN in Albany, New York and translator WCDC-TV in Adams, Massachusetts and a SSA with WXXA
• WRIC-TV in Richmond, Virginia
• WBAY-TV in Green Bay, Wisconsin
• KWQC-TV in Davenport, Iowa
• KELO-TV in Sioux Falls, South Dakota and its translators throughout South Dakota
• KLFY in Lafayette, Louisiana

Young Broadcasting would retain ownership of all of its stations, including three stations that Gray would not operate: KRON-TV in San Francisco, California, WATE-TV in Knoxville, Tennessee, and WLNS-TV in Lansing, Michigan, the latter two due to Gray already owning stations in those markets. Gray considered the possibility of purchasing the Young stations if they go on the market.^[13]

The agreement ended without any further extensions on December 31, 2012, and Young eventually agreed to a merger with Media General in mid-2013.

References

External links

• Official Website