The recent acquisition of WNCM-FM in the Rocky Mount-Wilson NC market announced by Jim Goodmon’s Capitol Broadcasting represented a small stretch from its Raleigh-Durham HQ. But its acquisition of the NextMedia cluster in Wilmington NC represents a full-fledged expansion. And while the Rocky Mount move will cost a modest $825K, the move into Wilmington is pegged at $12M. Coming in the transaction are WILT-FM, WAZO-FM, WKXB-FM, WGLO-FM & WMFD-AM. Technically, the deal is not a full-fledged expansion, however. Capitol is already in the market on the television side with CBS WILM. However, no cross-ownership rules will be impacted, as the CBS outlet is a mere LPTV.
RBR/TVBR observation: In addition to assimilating (or preparing to assimilate) all of these radio stations, Capitol is facing the task of getting its LPTV up to snuff for the early DTV transition Wilmington guinea-pigged itself for. The deadline for DTV in the southeast corner of North Carolina is 9/8/08 – that’s just about a month and a half away.
