Excalibur Broadcasting is buying CW WQCW-TV and companion WOCW-LP in the Charleston-Huntington WV DMA, and will enter into an SSA with Gray Television for backroom services provided by Gray’s NBC WSAZ-TV.
The seller is Lockwood Broadcast Group, and the price will be $5.5M.
For Excalibur, this is a backyard acquisition — it’s President and owner, Don Ray, is a resident of Huntington, West Virginia, and was formerly the GM of WSAZ-TV. He said, “Acquiring the Tri-State’s CW while simultaneously leveraging the resources of WSAZ for WQCW’s benefit presents an incredible opportunity to provide better service for area viewers and local businesses.”
Kevin Latek, Gray’s Senior Vice President for Business Affairs, observed, “Gray is excited to work with Lockwood and Excalibur in this important market. We look forward to building upon the talent and resources of both WSAZ and WQCW to better serve the greater Charleston and Huntington region.”
WQCW-TV is licensed across the Ohio River in Portsmouth OH, and WOCW-LP beams the programming directly from Charleston.
Wells Fargo analyst Marci Ryvicker said her company likes the deal and what it signals. She commented, “In our view, this is another nice (but small) tuck-in deal that meets GTN’s M&A criteria, and indicates that the company is trying to be more aggressive in consolidation.”
