KEY POINTS:
Bruce Gordon's WIN Television Network, Australia's largest private media company, offered to buy regional broadcaster NBN Television, rivalling a bid from James Packer's PBL Media.
The bidders had to submit final offers by 5pm yesterday, the Newcastle, Australia-based owner of NBN, SP Telemedia, said.
Gordon made a "binding offer" on Friday, four days after SP Telemedia agreed to deal exclusively with James Packer for an unspecified period of time.
WIN's bid for the affiliate of PBL's Nine Network in central and northern New South Wales extends a two-month bidding war between the TV billionaires.
Gordon 10 days ago beat Packer with a A$163 million ($182 million) bid to buy Sunraysia Television, owner of Nine's station in Perth.
"NBN is the last piece of the puzzle for us in the regional market," WIN executive chairman Andrew Gordon, Bruce's son, said. He declined to comment when asked whether the offer was about A$180 million.
SP Telemedia said the board would accept the best bid promptly after yesterday's deadline, and put it to a shareholder vote if required. Nine offered more than A$170 million, according to the Australian newspaper.
Shares of SP Telemedia rose A2c to A96.5c. The stock has gained 24 per cent this year.
WIN, which started out in 1979 with a Wollongong television station bought from Rupert Murdoch, owns 24 regional Nine Network stations across Australia, as well as 45 per cent of Sunraysia and 13 per cent of SP Telemedia.
Owning the two stations would give Gordon more bargaining power in negotiations about affiliation rates it has to pay PBL for airing Nine's programmes.
WIN currently pays an average of 34 per cent of its stations' advertising sales, Andrew Gordon said.
He played down reports the company was aiming to buy the stations including NBN, Australia's highest-rating regional station, to become more attractive for a share sale.
"We have a mixed view on going public," Gordon said. "It's not something that we've settled on."
PBL bid for Channel Nine Perth and NBN to extend its television network and boost advertising sales, which have declined along with Nine's falling viewer ratings.
Nine is Australia's only network that doesn't own stations in all of the nation's five biggest cities.
Packer is Australia's richest man with an estimated personal wealth of US$5.5 billion ($7.44 million), according to Forbes magazine.
Bruce Gordon, based in Bermuda, ranks 13th with US$1.1 billion.
- BLOOMBERG
