NBC Universal confirmed that it is in exclusive negotiations to buy The Weather Channel and weather.com from Landmark Communications, after Time Warner dropped out of the bidding. The price is reported to be around $3.5 billion – a far cry from the $5 billion that had been bandied about when the bidding began. NBC Universal is being joined in its bid by The Blackstone Group and Bain Capital.
Landmark has also been seeking bids on its television stations and newspapers, but the sell-off had first focused on the crown jewel, The Weather Channel.
RBR/TVBR observation: This has to be good news for NBC affiliates who are running the network’s NBC Weather Plus on DTV multicast channels. The big competitor will now be part of your operation.
