It’s official: Weather Channel sold to NBC
Michael Gay July 6th, 2008
A group of investors, led by NBC Universal, closed the deal to acquire the Weather Channel, according to the NY Times. The price is reported to be around $3.5 billion, although an official number was not announced. TWC will not be folded into NBC’s Weather Plus, instead being run independently. The NBC Nightly News tonight said that the deal is expected to be completed before the end of the year. Jeffrey Zucker told the NYTimes that the future of Weather Plus was “undetermined at this point,” and said the company and its affiliate partners would evaluate it “in the next few months.”
More Coverage:
- Official press release
- Broadcasting & Cable
- paidContent.org
- Al Roker on the Weather Channel? (TV Decoder)
16 Comments Add your own
1. tdc | July 6th, 2008 at 6:40 pm
that’s a ton of $.
anyone care to take a stab at the breakdown of what the cable channel value v. the web channel and other businesses were valued at?
2. Tonto Weinstein | July 6th, 2008 at 7:03 pm
What’s that about if you can’t beat ‘em, buy ‘em? Watch as NBC promotes weather right out from underneath its own local affiliates.
NBC Weather+ is dead. There is no way it will continue beyond its current contract length because why would NBC want to compete with its new 3.5 billion dollar property?
3. Charles | July 6th, 2008 at 7:12 pm
Hopefully this means more severe weather coverage. TWC severely lacks that. Anytime there’s heavy storms, snow, a rash of tornadoes, or the like, the cable news networks are all over the story while TWC gives you travel forecast conditions in Europe. Hopefully NBCU can turn the channel away from being the Forecast Channel and make it into a Weather Channel.
4. Doppler | July 6th, 2008 at 7:13 pm
I’m with Tonto - they can say WxPlus won’t get folded into TWC, but I think we all know somehow, there won’t end up being an NBC WxPlus, and an NBC Weather Channel….
5. Anonymous | July 6th, 2008 at 8:40 pm
Charles, I often see Weather Channel folks doing standups on other news programs during major storms. I thought their storm coverage was fine. They’ll even replace local inserts with extra info on the lower third so they can go wall-to-wall.
6. Liz | July 6th, 2008 at 10:07 pm
I can’t believe that the weather channel is that lucrative, especially considering that you can get weather news on the internet so easily.
7. Amanda E. | July 6th, 2008 at 10:24 pm
Nice to see NBC making an effort going after the 65+ and living in a nursing home demo.
8. Brink | July 7th, 2008 at 5:04 am
Does anyone still watch TWC anymore?
9. Hussman | July 7th, 2008 at 6:00 am
No, say it isn’t so. The L-bar will be dead?
10. Anonymous | July 7th, 2008 at 6:21 am
The Weather Channel beats the cable news networks in the morning. Plenty of people watch. And weather.com is a hot property as well.
I’m curious whether TWC people will continue to appear on other news programs during storms.
11. Charlie | July 7th, 2008 at 8:32 am
new lead in for Fritz at KNBC:
“Now, with the Exclusive AccuWeather forecast, brought to you by the Weather Channel, and available 24×7 on NBC Weather+, here’s Fritz Coleman…”
12. SAM | July 7th, 2008 at 8:37 am
wonder if this eventually puts MyWeather/WeatherCentral out of business?
13. TR | July 7th, 2008 at 8:05 pm
On the contrary…since with the TWC purchase NBC now owns WSI also as well as the Enterprise radar company I would think everyone that’s not an NBC affiliate would be looking at Weather Central or Accuweather as an alternative now…
14. Anonymous | July 8th, 2008 at 1:49 am
Don’t they have a channel with rotting vegetables and meat or something? I’m just so not interested.
15. Anonymous | July 14th, 2008 at 10:52 am
NBC didn’t buy the weather it seems.
16. phyllis | September 1st, 2008 at 6:11 am
I think MARGRET SHOULD BE FIRED FOR CAMPAIGNING FOR OBAMA AND AGAINST MCCAIN WHILE TALKING TO THE SENATOR ABOUT THE HURRICAINE JUST A FEW MINUTES AGO. NOW I KNOW WHY NBC BOUGHT THE WEATHER CHANNEL. I WILL NOT BE WATCHING IT ANY LONGER
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