Philip Falcone‘s HC2 Station Group has just filed its third Form 345 FCC filing this week, and this time around the owner of the Azteca América broadcast TV network is acquiring a licensed and silent LPTV facility in a big Midwestern market.
An escrow deposit has already been made, as the asset purchase agreement is dated July 31.
The latest addition to the rapidly growing stable of HC2 O&O stations is WPVS-LP 29 in Milwaukee.
Polnet Communications is selling the station to HC2 for $400,000; a $20,000 escrow deposit is being held by Stahl Cowen Crowley Addis LLC, as agent.
The asset purchase agreement filed August 17 comes following a Dec. 17, 2017 letter of intent that spells out the plan by Polnet to sell WPVS to HC2. Originally, $450,000 was set at the purchase price; that was lowered by $50,000.
Serving as the broker in this transaction, representing the seller, is Kozacko Media Services. The fee is 5% of the total purchase price of the assets.
It’s a profitable deal for Polnet, which acquired WPVS in May 2010 for $295,000 from Sheboygan Community Broadcasting, in a deal that saw Bob Heymann of Media Services Group serve as the broker.
Polnet has been scaling back properties of late outside of its home market of Chicago. In May, RBR+TVBR reported on the sale of Class B WLIM-AM 1580 in Patchogue, N.Y., for $350,000. WRKL-AM 910 in Rockland County, N.Y. has been on the market for more than five years.
What does the future hold for WPVS? It will likely take on the Azteca América network, which presently airs on DTV America Corp.-owned WTSJ-LP 38 in Milwaukee.
Azteca América has had a bumpy history with WTSJ, the former WBWT-LP. In July 2012, it was dropped in favor of now-defunct Hispanic-targeted broadcast TV networks MundoFox. With DTV’s acquisition of the station from the former Adelante Media Group in summer 2015, Azteca programming returned via the DT-2 digital multicast channel — only to be dropped in December 2015. It eventually returned in late October 2016 via WTSJ’s main signal as MundoFox’s successor network, MundoMax, ceased operations.
As such, HC2 could be securing a property that no longer puts Azteca at risk of losing its place in the nation’s 35th largest TV market.
