Ten are reporting that they are in the midst of renegotiating content deals that could lead to a significant savings
Edit: ten have “agreed in principle the vast majority of commercial terms” - expected to save 50% of future liability
I find it interesting that they’ve labelled their satellite feeds as “ASS 3” and “ASS 7”
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The paperwork
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So it’s looking good for ten at the moment. All the predictions of ten being shutdown on certain websites (news orgs) have been grossly over stated.
I think they can find someone to take on the debt and re organise the network. It’s happened before and ten be successful once agin. They need to get rid of management and get rid of dead weight they currently have.
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##ten Group Enters Voluntary Administration.
Ten Network Holdings Limited (ASX: TEN) (“TEN” or “the Company”) announces that Mr Mark Korda, Ms Jennifer Nettleton and Mr Jarrod Villani of Korda Mentha have been appointed as voluntary administrators of the Company and each of its subsidiaries listed in the attached schedule (together the “Ten Group”) by the Ten Group Directors.
This decision follows correspondence received from Illyria and Birketu over the weekend which left the Directors with no choice but to appoint administrators.
This decision comes despite the Ten Group making significant progress to realise the potential sources of improvements to future earnings identified in the Company’s Directors’ Report contained in its Half Year Financial results announcement, that is:
• delivery of the cost and revenue initiatives identified in the transformation process currently underway;
• renegotiation of material programming contracts; and
• reduction in Federal Government imposed licence fees.
In relation to the transformation process, the Company has identified initiatives that are expected to have a positive impact on earnings in the order of at least $50 million in FY18 and potentially more than $80 million per annum by FY19.
In relation to the renegotiation of programming contracts, the Company has agreed in principle the vast majority of the commercial terms of replacement volume content supply agreements with its US studio partners, Fox and CBS, although final terms have not yet been formally agreed. The effect of these replacement content agreements, if finalised and implemented, would be to reduce by approximately 50% the Group’s future liabilities for US content, while still allowing TEN access to the best productions of those studios over the medium term.
In relation to the reduction in Federal Government imposed licence fees, TEN anticipates that after the changes to regulations anticipated to be tabled in Parliament tomorrow pass through the Parliamentary process, the reduction in licence costs for TEN in FY17 will be in the order of $22 million and, in FY18, $12 million.
The administrators have advised the Company that they will work closely with management, employees, suppliers and content partners while they undertake a financial and operational assessment of the business. During this period, the Administrators intend to continue operations as much as possible on a business as usual basis.
The Directors of TEN regret very much that these circumstances have come to pass. They wish to take this opportunity to thank all TEN employees and contractors for their commitment and enthusiasm for TEN’s programs and business. In particular, they would like to express their sincere gratitude, respect and admiration for TEN’s leadership team, who have achieved everything the Board has asked them to do over the past few years in very challenging circumstances. They wish TEN and its management TEN all success in the future as the Administrators look to the potential sale or recapitalisation of the business.
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That’s one way of getting out of those expensive US content deals.
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But in theory, they have still gone bust.
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The issue is that the directors have withdrawn their guarantee for the loan, any money they save will be critical in the short term
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This could be a positive for the company overall. Mediaworks in NZ went into receivership with Korda Mentha as its receivers. At the time they had over 700million in debt most of which was wiped and I believe no one was made redundant during the receivership period. They also managed to either restructure or end their content agreements they had in place. These were mostly with US studios but they also Lost Home and Away as well.
No Mediaworks TV channels or radio stations went off air either at the time.
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Let’s not put the cart before the horse - while shutdown is unlikely, thats now ultimately a call for the administrator once they’ve assessed the situation
No one wants to see Ten shut and there will be great efforts expended to stop it from happening, but it’s not a done deal either way
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Very sad day.
So soon after yesterday’s announcement, but expected.
Wonder what will happen from here (apart from the obvious usual Australian insolvency processes)?
Can someone please succinctly clarify Fox / CBS matter in the presser?
That’s an impressive achievement and possibly bodes well for Ten, hopefully the same administrators are working on it
One would hope that once this process is complete and they hopefully find a new buyer, that they would completely rebrand/relaunch TEN into something new and fresh.
There is a lot of negativity associated with the brand now, especially after all the redundancies over the years.
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Ten have agreed to new terms (in principle), not a done deal yet though
Ten expect it to be at a lower cost without impacting their preferred “best” content
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There might be negativity within the industry about redundancies but I don’t think the general public care. They’ll watch a TV channel no matter what the brand if the content is good.
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They’ve identified $50million in savings. Hopefully that is the output deals and not the news division. Going froward they may need a news department if they can’t afford any other content.
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What will this mean for the other CBS/FOX content ie most of Eleven’s daytime schedule is from CBS.
Technically Warwick is correct. 
All of Ten’s woes started in early 2011 with the cancellation of 6pm Simpsons in favour of 6pm with George Negus / news revolution. And what an expensive disaster that was. Ten has never recovered.
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To be honest, I would shut down one. It won’t be missed and would save a lot!
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According to wikipedia, 10 might be on the brink of cessation of broadcasting.