Tribune Co has accepted a buyout offer from real estate investor Sam Zell in a deal valued at about US$8.2 billion, the media company said yesterday.
Tribune said Zell plans to invest US$315 million in the deal and the company will sell the Chicago Cubs baseball team at the end of this season.
He will eventually become chairman of the Chicago-based company's board when the deal is complete.
Members of a special committee of board members had spent much of the week sifting through dueling offers for the US's second-largest newspaper publisher by circulation.
The Zell offer involved an ESOP, which resembles a profit-sharing plan, but allows the company to borrow money and repay loans using pretax dollars.
Payments of both interest and principal are tax-deductible and would create more leverage for a buyer.
Tribune also is said to be considering a "self-help" plan that would involve spinning off the company's broadcast division and borrowing money to pay a one-time cash dividend to shareholders.
Like most newspaper companies, Tribune has been struggling with declining profits, circulation and advertising revenues.
Last month, the company announced revenue had fallen 3.4 percent in February as its publishing division continued to struggle.
In addition to the Chicago Tribune, the company owns nine other daily newspapers, including the Los Angeles Times, as well as 23 TV stations and the Chicago Cubs baseball team.
Tribune's share price fell about 50 percent from early 2004 until last spring and has languished at just above US$30 for months, down from an all-time high of $60.88 in November 1999.
Its shares climbed nearly 2 percent on Friday on the NYSE as investors awaited an announcement from the company.
Zell, 65, has earned a reputation as an astute investor, making his fortune reviving moribund real estate.
After a bidding war culminated in February, he sold his company, Equity Office, to the private equity firm Blackstone Group for US$23 billion.
He is proposed using an employee stock ownership plan as a way to lower the taxes of any sale, but has said he had no plans to break up the company.
Tribune said yesterday that it was planning to sell the Chicago Cubs at the end of this year's baseball season.
This would put one of its most valuable assets on the block as it simultaneously announced Zell was acquiring the media conglomerate.
Analysts have estimated that the Cubs could fetch US$600 million or more.
Tribune bought the baseball team in 1981 for approximately US$20 million.
"The Cubs have been an important part of Tribune for more than 25 years and are one of the most storied franchises in all of sports," said Dennis FitzSimons, Tribune chairman, president and chief executive officer.
"In our last season of ownership, the team has one mission, and that is to win for our great fans," her added.
Tribune said the company's 25 percent interest in Comcast SportsNetChicago would be part of the sale package.
Authorities have detained three former Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TMSC, 台積電) employees on suspicion of compromising classified technology used in making 2-nanometer chips, the Taiwan High Prosecutors’ Office said yesterday. Prosecutors are holding a former TSMC engineer surnamed Chen (陳) and two recently sacked TSMC engineers, including one person surnamed Wu (吳) in detention with restricted communication, following an investigation launched on July 25, a statement said. The announcement came a day after Nikkei Asia reported on the technology theft in an exclusive story, saying TSMC had fired two workers for contravening data rules on advanced chipmaking technology. Two-nanometer wafers are the most
NEW GEAR: On top of the new Tien Kung IV air defense missiles, the military is expected to place orders for a new combat vehicle next year for delivery in 2028 Mass production of Tien Kung IV (Sky Bow IV) missiles is expected to start next year, with plans to order 122 pods, the Ministry of National Defense’s (MND) latest list of regulated military material showed. The document said that the armed forces would obtain 46 pods of the air defense missiles next year and 76 pods the year after that. The Tien Kung IV is designed to intercept cruise missiles and ballistic missiles to an altitude of 70km, compared with the 60km maximum altitude achieved by the Missile Segment Enhancement variant of PAC-3 systems. A defense source said yesterday that the number of
A bipartisan group of US representatives have introduced a draft US-Taiwan Defense Innovation Partnership bill, aimed at accelerating defense technology collaboration between Taiwan and the US in response to ongoing aggression by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The bill was introduced by US representatives Zach Nunn and Jill Tokuda, with US House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party Chairman John Moolenaar and US Representative Ashley Hinson joining as original cosponsors, a news release issued by Tokuda’s office on Thursday said. The draft bill “directs the US Department of Defense to work directly with Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defense through their respective
Tsunami waves were possible in three areas of Kamchatka in Russia’s Far East, the Russian Ministry for Emergency Services said yesterday after a magnitude 7.0 earthquake hit the nearby Kuril Islands. “The expected wave heights are low, but you must still move away from the shore,” the ministry said on the Telegram messaging app, after the latest seismic activity in the area. However, the Pacific Tsunami Warning System in Hawaii said there was no tsunami warning after the quake. The Russian tsunami alert was later canceled. Overnight, the Krasheninnikov volcano in Kamchatka erupted for the first time in 600 years, Russia’s RIA
RSS