Sinclair Broadcast Group Responds To Dish Statement Regarding Retransmission Consent Negotiations

Sinclair Broadcast Group Responds To Dish Statement Regarding Retransmission Consent Negotiations

BALTIMORE, Aug. 14, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc. (Nasdaq: SBGI), the "Company" or "Sinclair," announced yesterday that its retransmission consent agreement with Dish Network, pursuant to which Dish carries 70 stations Sinclair owns or provides services to, is scheduled to terminate at midnight tomorrow, Wednesday, August 15, 2012.

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20100119/PH39783LOGO )

Although Sinclair released this announcement simply to provide the public with advance notice of a potential disruption in video service, Dish chose to put out an announcement attempting to blame Sinclair for the failure of the parties to reach agreement on a renewal. Although Sinclair does not believe it is helpful to negotiate private business matters in public, Sinclair felt compelled to respond to Dish's public attack and set the record straight. Sinclair notes that the prices it is requesting for its extremely popular stations are substantially lower than the amounts Dish is paying for other far less popular channels it carries as a result of Dish's flawed economic model that on a relative basis compensates channels with little to no audience share more than the broadcast channels. In addition, Sinclair notes that its negotiations with Dish, a company which is currently being sued by the ABC, CBS, FOX and NBC networks as a result of Dish providing its customers with technology that allows its subscribers to delete commercials, involve matters other than pricing.

Sinclair would also like to remind its viewers who are Dish subscribers that the Sinclair stations that may be dropped by Dish remain available from a variety of other sources. These sources include DirecTV, at least one cable company in each market, Verizon's FiOS or AT&T's U-Verse in many markets, and completely for free over-the-air. While Sinclair is sorry for any inconvenience to its viewers from having to switch providers, rather than taking Dish's suggestion to blame one party or another in these negotiations, Sinclair suggests its viewers would be better served by simply switching its video service to a provider of Dish that values Sinclair stations enough to carry them.

About Sinclair:

Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc., the largest and one of the most diversified, independent television broadcasting companies, owns and operates, programs or provides sales services to 74 television stations in 45 markets. Sinclair's television group reaches approximately 26.3% of U.S. television households and is affiliated with all major networks. Pro forma for the recently announced Newport acquisition, Sinclair will own and operate, program or provide sales services to 82 television stations in 47 markets, reaching 27.3% of the U.S. television households. Sinclair's television portfolio will include 21 FOX, 19 MNT, 15 CW, 11 ABC, 11 CBS, 3 NBC, 1 independent and 1 Azteca station. Sinclair owns equity interests in various non-broadcast related companies. The Company regularly uses its website as a key source of Company information and can be accessed at www.sbgi.net.

Forward-Looking Statements:

The matters discussed in this news release, include forward-looking statements regarding, among other things, future operating results. When used in this news release, the words "outlook," "intends to," "believes," "anticipates," "expects," "achieves," and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements. Such statements are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties. Actual results in the future could differ materially and adversely from those described in the forward-looking statements as a result of various important factors, including and in addition to the assumptions identified in this release, but not limited to, our ability to satisfy the closing conditions for the Newport acquisition discussed in this release, including obtaining required governmental approvals, our ability to obtain financing to fund such acquisition, our ability to consummate the transaction involving Deerfield Media discussed in this release, our ability to maximize our operating synergies in connection with the acquisitions, the impact of changes in national and regional economies, the volatility in the U.S. and global economies and financial credit markets, successful execution of outsourcing agreements, pricing and demand fluctuations in local and national advertising, volatility in programming costs, the market acceptance of new programming, the CW Television Network and MyNetworkTV programming, our news share strategy, our local sales initiatives, the execution of retransmission consent agreements, our ability to identify and consummate investments in attractive non-television assets and to achieve anticipated returns on those investments once consummated, and any other risk factors set forth in the Company's most recent reports on Form 10-Q, Form 10-K and Form 8-K, as filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. There can be no assurances that the assumptions and other factors referred to in this release will occur. The Company undertakes no obligation to publicly release the result of any revisions to these forward-looking statements except as required by law.

SOURCE Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc.

Photo:http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20100119/PH39783LOGO
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Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc.

CONTACT: Barry Faber, EVP & General Counsel, Sinclair, +1-410-568-1500

Web Site: http://www.sbgi.net


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