Tribune exits bankruptcy with new TV-focused board
Source: Associated Press
Tribune exits bankruptcy with new TV-focused board
| December 31, 2012 | Updated: December 31, 2012 5:44pm
CHICAGO (AP) More than four years after crushing debt and plunging advertising sales forced it to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, Tribune Co. has emerged with a new television-focused board and over $1 billion in new financing.
Led by such creative and technology heavyweights as Ross Levinsohn, the former interim CEO of Yahoo Inc., and Peter Murphy, former strategic officer of The Walt Disney Co., the board's roster suggests a focus on the company's TV assets rather than newspapers, which haven't managed to turn around declines in readership and advertising. Peter Liguori, a former TV executive at Discovery Communications Inc. and News Corp.'s Fox, is expected to be named CEO in the next several weeks.
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"Tribune is the poster child for the demise of the metropolitan newspaper," said Ken Doctor, a newspaper industry analyst with Outsell Inc. "Tribune remains a media company but likely drops the part of media that gave it its name and its birth, which is its newspapers."
Doctor says he expects that the Los Angeles Times and Chicago Tribune could be sold for around $600 million to $700 million. Interested bidders include News Corp.'s Rupert Murdoch, Freedom Communications owner Aaron Kusher, who bought the Orange County Register this summer, and Carlos Slim, the Mexican billionaire who invested in The New York Times Co., Doctor said.
Read more: http://www.chron.com/business/technology/article/Tribune-exits-bankruptcy-with-new-TV-focused-board-4156328.php