Mystery bidder on Seattle television set station: Michael Dell

Computer tycoon Michael Dell may maybe shortly have an additional Seattle connection, in add-on to getting one of Microsoft's ideal customers.

Dell could be the secret purchaser bidding on the Seattle tv station that are steering to be auctioned by method of a bankruptcy proceeding on June 30.

A institution linked toward cost business that handles the Dell loved types fortune submitted a "stalking horse" bid for Seattle's KFFV TV, providing $3.45 million for that 20-year-old station. That sets the opening worth for that company, meaning other people need to bid increased once the auction begins.

KFFV's key funnel amount is 44 and its key composed content is Spanish dialect tv Azteca. It operates 4 electronic channels that hold informercials and composed content in Mandarin, Cantonese and Korean. It has about 6 personnel at an business office south of downtown Seattle.

The station is owned and operated by North Pacific global Television, a husband-and-wife business that filed for bankruptcy safeguard in January 2010. thinking about that then the husband, Kenneth Casey, died and his wife, Charlene, made a decision to sell, based on her lawyer, Nate Riordan.

Meanwhile, Dell's cost business has long been buying for tv stations. Earlier this thirty day period its subsidiary, OTA Broadcasting, compensated $8 million for San Francisco-area station KTLN. It experienced been owned and operated by Christian Communications of Chicagoland, based on some declaration by business publication RBR.com.

Riordan confirmed that OTA could be the stalking horse bidder for KFFV. A spokesman for Dell's MSD budget declined to comment.

Dell possibly isn't wanting to appear to be considered a mass media mogul, or use stations to broadcast infomercials for Dell computers.

It's a whole whole lot more possibly that his cost celebration is producing a genuine estate play. The stations have swaths of spectrum, which the FCC is preparing to reclaim and auction away to businesses constructing wireless broadband networks.

Details aren't last and tv broadcasters aren't keen for the plan, but stations providing up range will be compensated with proceeds within auctions.

Depending for the deals supplied to tv stations, their range could be worth much a whole whole lot over the broadcasting business at tiny outfits like KFFV. individuals companies aren't hugely worthwhile and confront precisely the very same marketing problems affecting other mass media companies.

"Quite frankly, they get lots of rivals from cable,'' mentioned Frank Higney, a Tuscon, Ariz., broker managing the KFFV sale.

Higney mentioned the worth of independent, neighborhood stations plummeted once the electronic tv structure was adopted. The stations employed getting useful to businesses wanting to include additional channels within their neighborhood market. using the electronic format, they are able to merely include additional subchannels -- for example 4.1 and 4.2.

"If this have been 10 many years ago my stalking horse wouldn't be $3.5 million, it will be $35 million," he said.

Higney suspects that OTA is "looking at a distinctive business model." He understands of on the minimum 4 businesses producing range plays. Their method will be to "run the stations at a modest income using the wish of one thing coming within FCC range auction."

"They're not buying this merely because they need getting impartial tv managers in Seattle," he said. "They're buying it merely because they recognize there's worth in holding an FCC license and holding spectrum."

Dell may maybe have pole position, but other people have expressed attention in KFFV, Higney said.

"There are lots of distinctive entities, individuals displaying interest, but no subject whether they show as very much as bid can be an additional question," he said.

If nobody else bids, someone's steering getting telling Dell, "Dude, you've obtained a Seattle tv station."


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