Mediacom, Sinclair Reach Agreement
Mediacom Communications customers will get to see "American Idol," the NFL playoffs and other Sinclair Broadcast Group programming after all.
Cable operator Mediacom Communications Corp. and Sinclair Broadcasting Group Inc. signed a new 12-month agreement covering retransmission rights for TV programming, a day before an extension between the companies was set to expire.
About 700,000 Mediacom subscribers in Iowa and elsewhere in the Midwest were at risk of losing Sinclair programming if an agreement couldn't be reached. Among the stations are Fox and CBS affiliates in Cedar Rapids and a Fox affiliate in Des Moines.
Sinclair Broadcasting Group wanted Mediacom to pay more to carry its stations. Details of the agreement were not released.
Mediacom said the agreement covered retransmission rights for 22 television stations carried in its cable systems. Terms of the agreement weren't disclosed.
Terms were not disclosed. Marci Ryvicker, senior analyst with Wells Fargo Securities, estimated Sinclair was receiving north of 50 cents per subscriber.
Though the Sinclair-Mediacom retrans fight was dwarfed by the Fox-Time Warner negotiations, it was one of the most bitter. During the negotiations process, Mediacom called for Congress and the FCC to intervene in the process and change the retransmission consent rules.
The agreement, while restoring Sinclair's stations to 600,000 Mediacom subscribers, may have been more of a ceasefire than an end to hostilities. Immediately following Thursday’s (Jan. 7) announcement of the agreement, Rocco Commisso, CEO of Mediacom, fired off a letter to Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Chairman of the Commerce Subcommittee on Communications, Technology and the Internet.
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