[opendtv] It's not just me John
- From: Craig Birkmaier <craig@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: OpenDTV Mail List <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 2 Jun 2009 09:12:03 -0400
EXECUTIVE SESSIOIN WITH TONY CASSARA
It's Time For A New Business Model
TVNEWSDAY, Jun 1 2009, 10:49 PM ET
Veteran broadcaster Tony Cassara wants to reenter the TV station
business and may soon do so - albeit by a back door.
After three decades as a TV station sales and management executive,
Cassara is now advising some of the lenders who pumped a lot of money
into rapidly expanding broadcast groups a few years ago and are now
trying to salvage what they can.
If the lenders - or other investors who buy their notes on the cheap
- end up with controlling interest in a station group, Cassara may be
called in to run it.
After stints in broadcast sales, Cassara joined KTLA Los Angeles as
sales manager and was later upped to GM. In 1982, he fronted the
KKR-backed leveraged buyout of the station from Gene Autry for $245
million and he was still there when KKR sold the station to Tribune
just two years later for a then single-station record of $530 million.
From 1993 to 2000, he ran the Paramount Pictures Television Stations
Group. Starting in 2000, he worked closely with Jerry Perenchio in
expanding the Univision network and station group until they were
sold to a private equity consortium in March 2007.
In this interview with TVNewsday Editor Harry A. Jessell, Cassara
says he believes the business can rebound from its current
difficulties, but only if it can find new revenue, drastically cut
costs and get along with operating margins half of what they were
just a few years ago.
An edited transcript:
http://www.tvnewsday.com/articles/2009/06/01/daily.10/
----------------------------------------------------------------------
You can UNSUBSCRIBE from the OpenDTV list in two ways:
- Using the UNSUBSCRIBE command in your user configuration settings at FreeLists.org
- By sending a message to: opendtv-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the word
unsubscribe in the subject line.
Other related posts:
- » [opendtv] It's not just me John - Craig Birkmaier
