CHUM Purchases Craig Media

On December 1, 2004, CHUM Ltd. completed its acquisition of the shares of Craig Media Inc. for a purchase price of approximately $265 million from an ownership group consisting of Providence Equity Partners IV LP, Providence Equity Operating Partners IV LP, Manalta Investment Company Ltd., and St. Joseph Media Inc. Craig Media is a television broadcaster with five conventional stations located in Manitoba, Alberta and Ontario as well as three digital specialty channels.

Immediately after the completion of the transaction, CHUM sold the Toronto 1 television station it had acquired from Craig Media to Groupe TVA inc. and Sun Media Corp. for approximately $46 million. A syndicate of banks led by Royal Bank of Canada and the Toronto-Dominion Bank provided financing for CHUM’s purchase.

CHUM was represented in-house by Denise Cooper, vice-president, business and legal affairs, general counsel and secretary, and Andrew Heitelman, legal counsel, and by Fasken Martineau DuMoulin LLP with a team led by Roxanne McCormick (corporate) that consisted of, among others, Sean Stevens, Janice Javier and Dan Rankin (corporate) and Alan Schwartz and Mitchell Thaw (tax).

Craig Media was represented in-house by Jennifer Strain, vice-president,
corporate and regulatory affairs, and by McCarthy Tétrault LLP with a team led by Garth Girvan (corporate) that consisted of W. Ian Palm, Tara Rosenblatt and Keith Lau (corporate), Peter Grant and Grant Buchanan (broadcast) and Gabrielle Richards (tax).

The vendors of the Craig Media shares were represented by Michael Guttormson, Carmele Peter and Rob Lee of Aikins, MacAulay & Thorvaldson LLP for Manalta; Joseph Kuzneski, Jr. of Edwards & Angell in Rhode Island, and Stephen Halperin, Michael Partridge and Caroline Cook (corporate), Rob Malcolmson (communications), David Wiseman (banking) and Carrie Smit and Alan Bowman (tax) of Goodmans LLP for Providence; and Ruby Wong (corporate) of Goodman and Carr LLP for St. Joseph Media.

Groupe TVA and Sun Media were represented by in-house counsel Philippe Labelle and Frédéric Despars, respectively, and by Ogilvy Renault LLP with a team that comprised Clemens Mayr, Sara Joli-Coeur and Dustin Sean Isaacs (corporate).

Royal Bank of Canada, Toronto-Dominion Bank and the syndicate of lenders to CHUM were represented by Stikeman Elliott LLP with a team led by Sharon Polan that included Jill West, among others.