Seven has probably extended the former Prime station’s deals to infinite, now that Seven owns Prime Media
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That -is- what I meant, y’know, if not entirely clear 
The only other alternative being floated was that Paramount grab the SC10 stations, but I don’t see why they’d bother unless SCA was in an absolute fire sale state and wanted to focus entirely on Listnr and whatnot.
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I suppose they still will try and use poor ratings to try and reduce their fee, rather than let Ten have an upper hand just because they have no other options.
With their radio network they’d actually be in the best position content wise to threaten to walk and do an independent schedule.
Chuck a camera in the room for Hit/MMM breakfast and you’ve hit most quotas, throw in some Sky News and old movies and you’re done, and won’t do much worse than Ten does. There’s 0% chance of that happening, but a path to it would make it vaguely credible to take a tough line in negotiations.
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You’re watching ViEWR.
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You can’t have an affiliate deal with stations that you own.
Prime no longer exists. Seven fully owns the stations.
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I don’t have an idea on how they’d benefit from it - but I could imagine that being an accounting thing to still have it structured that way, making the individual business groups on paper be more or less profitable based on what’s best for shareholders/tax purposes.
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If WIN signed a 7 year agreement with Nine, would it have made much more sense if SCA had signed a 7 year agreement with ten? I’m not saying it’s the preferred outcome for both SCA and ten, but it could have been more straightforward and more clear. A 2 year agreement is a bit too short. What’s the point of having to sign more agreements more frequently?
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I think the short agreements was more of a hope that they’d be bought out by now. They’re not interested in regional TV and though they’ve received low ball offers I don’t think they’ve had much of an interest from any buyers.
I would’ve hoped that paramount global would’ve bought them out but the way they’re going I don’t think they’ll be looking for any assets to beef up their Australian operations.
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Flexibility - the deal was done at a time when it was hard to predict what the future held (although it was said at the time that all it was going to take was one domino to fall to lock in the affiliations permanently).
I’d imagine that SCA were expecting they’d have disposed of their television assets by now making a short agreement someone elses issue
Perhaps they were hoping they could sign with Seven? Not going to happen now of course.
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I reckon that was the plan
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What is SCA going to do now that nothing have happened yet in the last 2 years? Would they have to sign a 5 year agreement with ten then?
Either sign an agreement or go it alone and source programming elsewhere. The length doesn’t really matter as was mentioned. The 2 years was in the hope of getting the 7 one when the Prime/7 deal ran out but with 7 announcing their intention to fully buy Prime a couple of months after that, it put that plan to bed and with WIN and Nine sewn up and talk that will go further by the end of the agreement then that leaves SCA with not much to choose from. Seven for Tas, SA and NT, a couple of small pockets with Nine and then Ten for the majority.
If they had been prepared to split their stations I think they could have sold off the Seven affiliated stations to 7 and maybe tried to flog the others off at a loss then it’s someone else’s problem.
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SCA has said they wouldn’t sell the TV stations until the price is right for them to do so. But would SCA have been better or worse off if they had sold some of the stations to the 7 network and the others to 9 and 10?
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Why would News Corp buy into a dying medium of entertainment?
The regional affiliates merging with the networks will be the only way for them to survive in today’s climate. Now that Seven has tipped the first domino, it’ll be interesting to see television when the affiliation renewals come up in 2028.
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A proposal to merge SCA stations with the ten network cannot be ruled out, But I doubt that both ten network and SCA will be willing to consider a merger.
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Regional TV in the past has changed ownership on a market by market basis: SCA’s 10 affiliated stations would not be able to be given away let alone sold but its Tassie market may be of interest to 7 and probably nobody else. The Port Pirie and Broken Hill solus markets might be of interest to someone as they are still a monopoly there.
If Capital City 10 ever went broke there is still a chance WIN would buy the licences which would leave 9 in need of a regional station.
I feel sorry for all the TV workers in places like Launceston, Townsville and Coffs that have been left out of a job over the years. Recently staff in Port Pirie have also been left out of work too.
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Could WIN be interested in those areas similar to the other SA regional areas?
In relation to workers losing jobs, also Canberra and regional Victoria particularly Bendigo and Gippsland is included in the areas where people have lost their jobs as wall
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Add to those locations Toowoomba, Rocky, Ballarat, Orange, Tamworth, and Bunbury where WIN and Prime shutdown and regional TV is not a good story - probably a thousand plus previously steady jobs lost out of those towns. Canberra is the only place where they would have picked up replacement jobs relatively easily.
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Correct. Same as how all the metro Sevens are set up legally for tax/accounting purposes, they are all affiliates of 7NOL.