Bankrupt Black News Channel bought by media group for $11 million with plans to grow
The Black News Channel has been purchased by Allen Media Group, a cluster of media companies that includes the Weather Channel and HBCU GO . The sale comes more than three months after the channel suddenly shutdown and laid off 233 workers with less than a 24-hour notice.
The sale of substantially all of BNC's assets for $11 million was approved by Northern District of Florida, Tallahassee Division of the United States Bankruptcy Court, on Wednesday.
"We are excited to have been selected to acquire the Black News Channel, which has approximately 300 million linear and digital subscribers," said media mogul Byron Allen, the founder and CEO of the Allen Media Group in a prepared statement.
"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," he continued.
The sudden shutdown of the Black News Channel:
'Writing on the wall': Some Black News Channel employees foresaw close, but not so soon
Tallahassee-based Black News Channel files for bankruptcy, says it's $10M to $50M in debt
'It's a sad day': Tallahassee-based Black News Channel ceases operations, airs last show
Additionally, Allen plans to grow the distribution of the BNC to approximately 80 million homes over the next 6 months, widely eclipsing the channel's availability in 45 million homes through companies like Comcast, Charter and DirecTV.
Allen Media Group — which beat out other buyer who expressed interest like Ebony Studios LLC — will assume "all tangible property" previously owned by BNC including its commercial lease for the Tallahassee property at 2320 Killearn Center Blvd., dated October 26, 2018.
It's unclear what the purchaser will do with Tallahassee headquarters and its millions of dollars in equipment. The Democrat also requested comment on whether the Allen Media Group plans to rehire any staff laid-off in March.
On March 25, over 200 workers found out they were out of a job through a mass email from the outlet's CEO Princell Hair, who linked the source of the closure to "challenging market conditions and global financial pressures," which made the network "unable to meet our financial goals, and the timeline afforded to us has run out."
Since its Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing, BNC has operated at a limited capacity with only 17 paid employees, according to court records.
The ups and downs of the Black News Channel
The BNC — whose majority investor was Jacksonville Jaguars owner Shad Khan — launched in February 2020 in Tallahassee and was fraught with low ratings and controversy.
To start, the channel was not initially carried by Comcast Xfinity or Dish Network, leaving only viewers of Charter Spectrum cable to watch it.
After about six months, Hair joined the organization and was part of its large climb in viewership.
By the fall of 2021, BNC proclaimed itself as the country’s fastest growing cable news network in the country, spreading its access from an initial reach of 2 million households to more than 50 million homes and growing its workforce.
At its peak, BNC employed over 300 people.
Beginning in December, BNC laid off 88 employees over the two month period "to more properly align with the business's changing prospects," court records state.
Then in January, the outlet was sued for gender discrimination in a lawsuit by 13 current and former female employees who claimed they were paid substantially less than male counterparts and were disciplined for being too aggressive in the workplace, according to the Los Angeles Times. The company sought to dismiss the case.
By the time Hair's email went out in late March, many employees were insecure about their position at BNC.
The channel's bankruptcy announcement, however, arrived the same week its coverage of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson's confirmation hearings set a new viewership record.
Contact Christopher Cann at ccann@tallahassee.com and follow @ChrisCannFL on Twitter.
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This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Court approves $11 million sale of the Black News Channel media group
