Landmark Media Enterprises

Landmark Media Enterprises, LLC
Private
Genre Media
Founded 1905
Founder Samuel L. Slover, Frank Batten
Headquarters 150 Granby Street
Norfolk, Virginia 23510-2075
Key people
 Frank Batten Jr., Chairman, President and CEO
Subsidiaries Dominion Enterprises
Expedient
The Virginian-Pilot
Landmark Community Newspapers

Landmark Media Enterprises, LLC (formerly Landmark Communications) is a privately held media company headquartered in Norfolk, Virginia specializing in newspaper publishing, Internet publishing, software and data centers.

History

The company was founded in 1905 as Norfolk Newspapers, a holding company for the newspaper properties of Samuel L. Slover. They included papers which would eventually become today's Virginian-Pilot.

Frank Batten, Slover's nephew, took over the company in 1955, and changed its name to Norfolk-Portsmouth Newspapers Inc. in 1957 (reflecting the merger of the Norfolk Ledger-Dispatch and Portsmouth Star), then to Landmark Communications in 1967.[1] It became Landmark Media Enterprises in 2008. Landmark is controlled by the Batten family.

Properties

Landmark owns three daily newspapers:

The company also owns over 120 community and special-interest newspapers in 16 states. That includes seven publications that cover college sports at Florida State University, University of Florida, Indiana University, University of Iowa (Voice of The Hawkeyes), University of Nebraska, University of Kentucky and University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

The company owns two alternative newspapers, Norfolk's AltDaily and Richmond's Style Weekly.

Landmark owns Dominion Enterprises, which runs classified advertising websites such as ForRent.com and Homes.com for several sectors, including real estate, apartments, vehicles, parenting, travel, franchises and businesses for sale. Dominion also provides software as a service products to real estate agents, auto dealers, and motorcycle dealers.

The company also owns Expedient, a leading provider of data center (colocation), private and public clouds and managed data network services. Expedient has data centers in Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Boston, Baltimore, Columbus, Indianapolis and Memphis.

Former properties

Landmark's predecessor, Norfolk Newspapers, first entered broadcasting in 1930, when it bought Virginia's oldest radio station, WTAR. It later added Virginia's second television station (and Hampton Roads' first), WTAR-TV (now WTKR) and an FM station (now WVKL). It acquired WFMY-TV in Greensboro as part of its purchase of the Greensboro, North Carolina newspapers in 1965. However, U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) cross-ownership rules forced Landmark to sell off WFMY in 1976 and WTAR-TV in 1981. Under the rules, Landmark could not own both a newspaper and a television station in the same market.

Landmark was an owner of KNTV in San Jose, California from 1978–1990. During its 12-year ownership of the station, KNTV (then affiliated with ABC and serving the Monterey / Salinas media market) was its only station that was not an affiliate of the CBS network. Landmark also briefly owned WDBJ-TV in Roanoke, but was forced to sell it immediately due to FCC restrictions. Landmark owned The Travel Channel from 1992 to 1996, when it was sold to Paxson Communications.

The company owned Chicago magazine from 1990–1995, when it was sold to Primedia. At one time, Landmark owned a minority share of the Washingtonian magazine, until its rights were traded to Eleanor Merrill, widow of its publisher Philip Merrill, in exchange for full ownership of the Annapolis Capital and five other Maryland newspapers.[2]

Landmark owned the hobby publisher Antique Trader Publications until its sale to Krause Publications in 1999.[3] In December 2001, Landmark announced it would close its subsidiary Church Impressions, based in Greenville, North Carolina, which published church directories, portraits, and other print and web media products.

Landmark used to own four career training schools that focus on health-related career education: Glendale Career College, Certified Careers Institute, Nevada Career Institute and Virginia Career Institute.

On September 19, 2007, it was announced that Continental Broadband (CB), a Landmark Communications (Landmark Media Enterprises) company, sold its South Florida business unit, WebUnited, to Host.net, the leading provider of data center (colocation) and managed network services in Florida.[4] On May 15, 2009, it was announced that CB sold its Chicago business unit, ANET, to Cogent Communications, a global Internet service provider. On January 23, 2010, it was announced that CB sold its Richmond Business Unit, NET Telcos, to Cavalier Telephone, a full-service provider of telecommunications solutions.

In early 2008, the Landmark confirmed that it was exploring the sale of the entire company.[5] Two separate investment banks, JPMorgan Chase and Lehman Brothers, were hired to help with the sale of The Weather Channel and the newspapers.

Landmark's best-known media outlet was the Weather Channel, based in Atlanta, Georgia. As part of its divestiture, the company announced in July 2008 the $3.5 billion sale of its Weather Channel properties, which included its share of The Weather Network and weather.com, plus Weather Services International and MétéoMédia, to NBCUniversal and the private equity firms Blackstone Group and Bain Capital. Landmark and NBC Universal completed the sale on September 12, 2008.[6]

On July 14 of that year, it was announced that WTVF in Nashville, Tennessee would be sold to Bonten Media Group,[7] but that sale did not close. Landmark eventually sold the station to Journal Communications in 2012.[8][9]

In October 2008, the company announced that it was suspending the sale of most of its properties, citing the ongoing credit crisis, with the exception of The Virginian-Pilot newspaper.[10]

Landmark sold the News & Record newspaper in Greensboro, North Carolina to Berkshire Hathaway on January 31, 2013. In May 2013, Landmark sold the Roanoke Times, the metropolitan newspaper serving Roanoke, Virginia, also to Berkshire Hathaway.[11]

Landmark sold its Maryland newspapers to The Baltimore Sun Media Group on May 1, 2014.[12]

CBS affiliate KLAS-TV, based in Las Vegas, Nevada, was acquired by Landmark in 1978 from a trust left by Howard Hughes upon his death. On November 21, 2014, Nexstar Broadcasting Group announced that it planned to purchase KLAS for $145 million.[13] The sale closed on February 13, 2015.

In 2016, Dominion Enterprises sold Dominion Marine Media to funds advised by Apax Partners. The company is now called Boats Group.

In 2017, Dominion Enterprises sold Dominion Web Solutions to Eurazeo and West Street Capital Partners VII, a fund managed by the Goldman Sachs Merchant Banking Division. The company is now called Trader Interactive.

Financial news

In 2008, Landmark announced that it would terminate its pension fund, which covered some of its retirees and current employees. The plan was fully funded. The pension beneficiaries were able to choose between a lump-sum distribution or an annuity provided by an insurance company.

References

  1. ↑ "Timeline of Norfolk-area newspapers". The Virginian-Pilot. January 4, 2008. Retrieved June 5, 2013.
  2. ↑ Ahrens, Frank (2007-04-26). "Annapolis Newspaper Swapped for Washingtonian". The Washington Post. Retrieved 2010-05-07.
  3. ↑ Antique Trader – About Us
  4. ↑ Continental Broadband Continues Pursuit Of Its Business Plan With Strategic Move in South Florida Market
  5. ↑ Choyke, Bill; Walzer, Phil (2008-01-03). "Battens may sell The Roanoke Times' parent company". The Roanoke Times. Retrieved 2008-01-03.
  6. ↑ Sutel, Seth (2008-07-06). "NBC Universal to buy The Weather Channel for $3.5B". Associated Press. Archived from the original on 2008-07-20. Retrieved 2008-07-08.
  7. ↑ "Bonten Buys WTVF-TV Nashville from Landmark". Broadcasting & Cable. 2008-07-14. Retrieved 2008-07-14.
  8. ↑ "Journal Communications to Purchase NewsChannel 5, WTVF TV, Nashville, Tennessee from Landmark Media" (Press release). Journal Communications. 2012-09-04. Retrieved 2012-09-04.
  9. ↑ "Journal Communications to Acquire Landmark's WTVF NewsChannel5". Broadcasting & Cable. 2012-09-04. Retrieved 2012-09-04.
  10. ↑ "Landmark suspends sale of assets, but not the Pilot". Virginian Pilot. 2008-08-30. Retrieved 2008-11-27.
  11. ↑ John Reid Blackwell (May 31, 2013). "Berkshire Hathaway buys The Roanoke Times". Richmond Times-Dispatch. Retrieved June 5, 2013.
  12. ↑ Baltimore Sun Media Group buys The Capital in Annapolis and the Carroll County Times
  13. ↑ "Nexstar Buying KLAS Las Vegas For $145M". TVNewsCheck. November 21, 2014. Retrieved November 21, 2014.
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