By Joe Flint 

This article is being republished as part of our daily reproduction of WSJ.com articles that also appeared in the U.S. print edition of The Wall Street Journal (March 23, 2018).

Comedian-turned-media-entrepreneur Byron Allen struck a deal to acquire the Weather Channel from Comcast Corp. and private-equity firms Blackstone Group LP and Bain Capital for $300 million.

Mr. Allen said Thursday that he is buying the Atlanta-based television network through his company, Allen Media LLC.

The head of Entertainment Studios Inc., which owns eight cable networks such as Pets.TV and Comedy.TV and produces movies and television shows, Mr. Allen said the widely distributed Weather Channel will provide leverage to expand the rest of his holdings.

"It is a stronger relative to help pull us along," Mr. Allen said. He plans to acquire other independent media assets to better position his company in the wake of consolidation among bigger media firms, including AT&T Inc.'s purchase of satellite broadcaster DirecTV and proposed acquisition of Time Warner Inc., which is being challenged in court by the Justice Department.

Once in more than 95 million homes, the Weather Channel's national distribution has fallen over the past decade to just over 80 million homes. Much of the subscriber losses can be attributed to consumers cutting the cord to their traditional pay-TV packages in favor of lower-priced streaming services, an issue facing cable networks across the dial.

The Weather Channel does have its own special set of issues that could make future growth challenging. Weather information is now readily available to consumers via mobile devices. Efforts by the Weather Channel to go beyond rain and snow and into entertainment and reality programming have fallen flat, and cable and satellite operators have squeezed the network to lower its distribution fees.

Mr. Allen said he doesn't plan major changes in the network's format beyond more investment. "An app can only for the most part tell you what the temperature is; it can't give you the in-depth information you need to navigate you and your family's life," he said.

For Comcast, Bain and Blackstone, the sale ends a less-than-stellar run with the Weather Channel assets. NBCUniversal, then owned by GE, along with the private-equity firms purchased the Weather Channel from closely held Landmark Communications in 2008 for about $3.5 billion. Comcast inherited NBCUniversal's 25% stake in the Weather Channel when it bought NBCUniversal from GE. In 2015, the owners sold the digital assets to IBM for about $2 billion.

The involvement of Comcast and Mr. Allen in a deal is a case of strange bedfellows. Mr. Allen's Entertainment Studios filed a $20 billion racial discrimination lawsuit in 2016 against Comcast, a case that is still going through the appeals process. That suit alleged Comcast didn't comply with an agreement it made to the Federal Communications Commission to launch new networks with African-American ownership as part of getting approval to purchase NBCUniversal.

Mr. Allen said he is continuing with his suit against Comcast and that the Weather Channel purchase isn't related to his legal fight.

A Comcast spokesman declined to comment the company's legal fight with Mr. Allen.

Mr. Allen is also in a similar fight with Charter Communications Inc.

He said one of the suits will be settled and the other one he will "take all the way." Asked which he would settle, Mr. Allen said, "That depends on them."

A Charter spokeswoman declined to comment on the company's legal issues with Mr. Allen.

Jaewon Kang contributed to this article.

Write to Joe Flint at joe.flint@wsj.com

 

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

March 23, 2018 02:47 ET (06:47 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2018 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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