Irvine-based Freedom Communications Inc. has made its first deal under Chief Executive Scott Flanders, paying $17 million for an upstate New York TV station.
Freedom acquired Albany’s WCWN-TV, a WB affiliate, from Chicago’s Tribune Co.
Locally, Freedom’s Orange County Register newspaper competes with Tribune’s Los Angeles Times.
The buy is part of Flanders’ strategy to increase “our audience and advertising share in every market we serve,” he said.
The acquisition is Freedom’s first TV station buy in eight years. The company owns eight other TV stations, including Albany’s WRGB-TV, a CBS affiliate.
The Federal Communications Commission still needs to OK the transfer of WCWN’s broadcast licenses, Freedom said.
The station being acquired is set to become a CW affiliate in September. WB and UPN are combining forces to create the CW network.
Flanders took over running Freedom, Orange County’s dominant media company, in January.
Before that, he ran CD and video marketer Columbia House Co. and oversaw its sale to Germany’s Bertelsmann AG.
