What do Jennifer Aniston, Sarah Jessica Parker and Ray Romano have in common with the Tribune company? Many, many dollars, Forbes.com reports.
Future bidding wars for syndicated reruns of hit sitcoms like Friends, Sex in the City and Everybody Loves Raymond could be affected by the possible sale or breakup of Tribune’s (nyse: TRB – news – people ) TV station holdings.
Ever since Tribune’s board said in September that it was exploring “value creation alternatives” (i.e., a potential sale of all or part of the company), much of the attention has been focused on buyer interest in the company’s newspaper business, particularly its largest daily, the Los Angeles Times.
But Tribune’s stable of 25 stations makes it the fifth-largest owner of stations in the country, in terms of audience reach. And depending on what happens to those assets, Hollywood studios that sell syndicated TV programming, such as News Corp. (nyse: NWS – news – people ), CBS (nyse: CBS – news – people ), the Walt Disney Co. (nyse: DIS – news – people ) and General Electric’s (nyse: GE – news – people ) NBC Universal, may one day turn to a market with one less major buyer.
