Byron Allen’s Allen Media Group Acquires Black News Channel

Byron Allen’s Allen Media Group is set to acquire Black News Channel out of bankruptcy for $11 million from billionaire Shahid Khan, owner of the NFL’s Jacksonville Jaguars franchise.

The announcement from AMG follows an order from the Northern District of Florida, Tallahassee Division of the United States Bankruptcy Court approving the sale of “substantially all” of the channel assets. The assets will be acquired free and clear of all liens, claims, encumbrances and interests.

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Allen Media Group

According to AMG, the acquisition will add 300 million linear and digital subscribers to the AMG portfolio of assets which includes 12 television networks such as The Weather Channel, digital platforms Local Now, HBCU GO, Sports.TV, theGrio Streaming App and The Weather Channel Streaming App.

AMG has also invested over $1 billion in the last 3 years to acquire 27 ABC-NBC-CBS-FOX network affiliate broadcast television stations nationwide.

Khan had invested over $100 million into BNC, according to AMG.

“We are excited to have been selected to acquire the Black News Channel, which has approximately 300 million linear and digital subscribers,” said Byron Allen, Founder/Chairman/CEO of Allen Media Group. “Allen Media Group will deliver a best-in-class network to serve the underserved African-American community and the advertisers who want to reach this extremely valuable audience. Also, we appreciate the opportunity to provide cable operators, satellite companies, telcos, and digital platforms diversity of ownership, voices, and viewpoints on their programming line-ups by having a 100 percent African-American owned network.”

BNC has carriage on traditional linear packages via Comcast, Charter, Cox, DISH, DirecTV, and Verizon, and currently has approximately 45 million linear subscribers. Allen says he plans to grow the distribution to approximately 80 million linear subscribers over the next 6 months.

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