Capital Cities/ABC
On March 18, 1985, Capital Cities announced that it would purchase ABC for $3.5 billion, which shocked the media industry, as ABC was some four times bigger than Capital Cities was at the time. Berkshire Hathaway chairman Warren Buffett helped to finance the deal in exchange for a 25% share in the combined company.[26][27] The deal was, at the time, the largest non-oil merger in world business history.[28] However, this record would be surpassed by year's end by the merger of General Electric and RCA (the latter company then being the parent company of rival network NBC).[29]
The newly merged company, known as Capital Cities/ABC[2] (or CapCities/ABC), was forced to sell off some stations due to FCC ownership limits. Between them, ABC and CapCities owned more television stations than FCC rules allowed at the time. Also, the two companies owned several radio stations in the same markets.[30] Of the former Capital Cities television stations, the new company opted to keep the outlets in Philadelphia, Houston, Durham, and Fresno. WFTS and ABC's WXYZ-TV in Detroit were divested as a pair to the E. W. Scripps Company's broadcasting division (then known as Scripps-Howard Broadcasting). WTNH and WKBW-TV were sold separately to minority-owned companies;[31] WKBW-TV would eventually be acquired by E.W. Scripps by 2014. WTNH would have been sold in any event due to a significant signal overlap with ABC flagship WABC-TV in New York City. At the time, the FCC normally did not allow companies to own two television stations with common coverage areas (known commonly as the "one-to-a-market" rule), and would not even consider granting a waiver for a city-grade overlap.
The merged company could have been forced to sell off WPVI as well due to a large Grade B signal overlap with WABC-TV. Citing CBS' ownership of television stations in New York City (WCBS-TV) and Philadelphia (at the time WCAU-TV) under grandfathered status, Capital Cities/ABC requested, and was granted a permanent waiver from the FCC allowing it to keep WPVI-TV. Had the waiver request been denied, WXYZ-TV would have been retained.
WPVI-TV and KTRK-TV had long been ABC affiliates (in fact, two of ABC's strongest affiliates), while WTVD and KFSN-TV, longtime CBS affiliates, respectively switched to ABC in August and September 1985.
On the radio side, new owners were found for CapCities' WPAT stations (Park Communications was the buyer), WKBW (Price Communications, the new owner, changed its call letters to WWKB, which was necessitated due to an FCC regulation in effect then that forbade TV and radio stations in the same city, but with different owners from sharing the same call letters) and KLAC and KZLA-FM (to Malrite Communications), and ABC's WRIF-FM in Detroit (to a minority-owned concern), among others.[32]
The merger was completed on January 3, 1986. Capital Cities/ABC retained ABC's radio and television combinations in New York City (WABC, WABC-TV and WPLJ), Los Angeles (KABC, KABC-TV and KLOS), Chicago (WLS, WLS-FM and WLS-TV), and San Francisco (KGO and KGO-TV), along with WMAL and WRQX-FM in Washington, D.C.; CapCities' aforementioned television outlets and the Detroit, Providence, Marietta and Fort Worth radio stations; Fairchild Publications; the Fort Worth Star-Telegram and the Kansas City Star; and other broadcasting and publishing properties.[12] Orbis Communications immediately purchased the syndication rights to the Capital Cities production library.[33] The library was then leased to pay cable channel HBO for two years for its Family Specials library of 26 titles.[34]
In May 1991, Capital Cities/ABC's Farm Progress Cos. closed its purchase of Harcourt Brace Jovanovich Inc.'s 12-magazine farm publishing group.[35] In 1992, Capital Cities/ABC sold Word Inc.'s music and book publishing to Thomas Nelson.[36] In 1992, ABC launched its new home video unit ABC Video, which was headed by former Vestron Video employee Jon Peisinger.[37] In February 1993, the company formed a television production joint venture with Brillstein-Grey Entertainment to tap into their managed talent and to take advantage of relaxed production regulations.[38][39] In July, CC/ABC purchased a majority ownership in animation studio DIC Animation City, forming a joint venture called DIC Entertainment L.P.[40]
In 1994, CC/ABC agreed to a $200 million seven-year television production joint venture with the original DreamWorks live-action studio.[45] Also that year, CC/ABC formed a partnership with Brillstein/Grey Entertainment to launch Brillstein/Grey Communications.[46]
The Walt Disney Company announced that it would acquire Capital Cities/ABC in 1995.[47][48] This merger of equals led to the formation of a new subsidiary, ABC, Inc., on September 19, 1996. The merger did not include the Farm Progress publishing assets, which were spun off to foreign interests in 1997.[49] Other publishing assets were likewise divested to other companies.[50]
