Report: Newport TV Shopping Stations

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Providence Equity Partners is putting its Newport Television stations on the block, according to a report on Reuters.com. Reuters says Moelis & Company has been hired to explore the potential sale.

Newport operates 56 stations and is run by Sandy DiPasquale. A Newport rep said Sandy is out of the office most of the week, and a message for Michael DiPasquale, VP of operations, was not returned on short notice at presstime.

Newport includes the former Clear Channel TV group. The sale to Providence Equity Partners for just over a billion dollars closed in 2008, after a 17% reduction in the originally agreed on price. The billion dollar deal easily dwarfs any other station group sale in recent years.

Michael Malone
Michael Malone

Michael Malone is content director at B+C and Multichannel News. He joined B+C in 2005 and has covered network programming, including entertainment, news and sports on broadcast, cable and streaming; and local broadcast television, including writing the "Local News Close-Up" market profiles. He also hosted the podcasts "Busted Pilot" and "Series Business." His journalism has also appeared in The New York Times, The L.A. Times, The Boston Globe and New York magazine.