Univision

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Univision

Type	Broadcast Television Network
Country	United States Canada Mexico Puerto Rico
Availability	Nationwide across the U.S. with some programs reproduced in Mexico, Canada and Puerto Rico
Founded	1955 (Through KWEX-TV)
Founder	Raoul A. Cortez
Owner	TPG Capital, L.P.
Launch date	1961 as SIN 1986 as Univision
Past names	Spanish International Network (1961-1987)
Website	www.univision.com

Univision is a Spanish-language television network in the United States. It has the largest Hispanic audience, largely due to telenovelas and other Mexican programs produced by Grupo Televisa.

Univision is headquartered in Los Angeles, California and major production facilities/operations are in Miami, Florida. It is available on cable in most of the country, with local stations in several markets with large Hispanic populations. Most of these stations air full local news and programming in addition to network shows. Univision's major programming is closed-captioned in Spanish, but unlike main competitor Telemundo, it almost never provides English subtitles.

The network was recently sold to a consortium led by Jewish-Egyptian billionaire Haim Saban, TPG Capital, L.P. and Thomas H. Lee Partners for $12.3 billion or $36.25 per share plus $1.4 billion in acquired debt. That deal closed on March 29, 2007. Its ownership of the network will be immediate.

On March,12 Joe Uva became the new CEO uf Univision Communications, inc.

1 History
2 Primetime Schedule
3 Shows
4 Other Properties
5 See also
6 References
7 External links and sources

[edit] History

Univision dates its origins to 1955, when KCOR-TV, later KWEX-TV, began broadcasting to the Hispanic community in San Antonio, Texas. That station was part of the Spanish International Network (SIN), Univision's predecessor. SIN was owned by Telesistema Mexicano, Mexico's largest private broadcaster and the forerunner of Televisa.

SIN or Univision's largest rated affiliate, KMEX-TV channel 34 of Los Angeles went on air in 1962 and some experts in the television industry considers KMEX-TV a launching point in the history of American Latino media. In the next 20 years, SIN would acquire other high-rated Spanish language television throughout the Western United States, then expanded the market to Florida, New York City and Chicago, Illinois.

1986 was a pivotal year for the station group and the network. Emilio Nicolas, Sr., President of SICC sold the television station group to Hallmark Greeting Cards and Azcarraga, the owner of SIN changed the name from SIN to Univision. Univision's new CEO Joaquin Blaya was to sign the contracts for two programs that would change the network. Blaya signed Cristina, now a famous talk show host and Mario Kreutzberger who brought from Chile his famous Don Francisco of Sabado Gigante. Under Hallmark ownwership, Joaquin Blaya and Jose Cancela, the first morning television program by the network was launched, Mundo Latino anchored by Lucy Pereda and Frank Moro, who were both Cuban.

In 1988, the network began to produce television shows with a national audience in mind. The first production was titled "TV Mujer" (TV Woman). The program was a magazine styled show aimed to the Hispanic woman living in the United States. Anchored by Lucy Pereda during its first year and Gabriel Traversari, the program consisted of a melange of cooking and entertainment segments. Pereda was replaced shortly after finishing her first year by Mexican Lauri Flores who hailed from Houston, Texas. Flores was not as successful in making the transition and filling Pereda's place and saw her role diminished as the third season came upon the program. A model from "Sabado Gigante" became the third host in its last year -- Jackie Nespral, who made the transition from entertainment to news as quickly as the program was cancelled.

"TV Mujer" begat a series of other programs: "Hola, America", "Al Mediodia" before they were all cancelled never really getting the ratings of the original concept.

Univision then decided to expand news programming in the afternoon and launched "Noticias y Mas" with the before mentioned Nespral and a team of three other anchors: Ambrosio Hernandez, Myrka de Llanos and Raul Peimbert. In 1990, Hernandez bolted for the local Telemundo station, WSCV-51 to anchor its evening news programming, being joined by Peimbert shortly after that being wooed to anchor the new Telemundo evening news. Nespral left to join the weekend edition of the "Today" show leaving De Llanos on the anchor desk by herself. Univision had other plans for the moribund show. They revamped it, changed the name, the theme music and installed a weekend reporter to be De Llanos' partner: Puerto Rican born Maria Celeste Arraras who joined the now tabloid news program called "Primer Impacto".

In 2002, Univision entered into a local marketing agreement (LMA) with Raycom Media to operate two television stations in Puerto Rico: WLII in Caguas and WSUR-TV in Ponce. At the time, WLII had a longtime LMA with another Puerto Rican station, WSTE, which Univision honored. It was also around this time that Univision resumed broadcast expansion by signing affiliation agreements with stations in Raleigh, North Carolina, Cleveland, Ohio, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and Atlanta, Georgia among many others -- most of which where acquired from USA Broadcasting and had previously been affiliated with the Home Shopping Network. Both WLII and WSUR-TV were then sold to Univision in 2005.

In late 2004, a feud began between Univision's chairman, 78-year old entertainment guru Jerry Perenchio, and the 32-year old head of Televisa, Emilio Azcárraga Jean. The dispute is about Univision's continual editing of Televisa's programming, and failure to pay for transmission of Televisa produced sports and specials. The feud has intensified to the point where Televisa's most famous stars have been banned from appearing on any Univision-produced shows and specials. In addition, Televisa has filed a lawsuit against Univision for breach of contract.

In recent years, Univision has also lost several key on air personalities to Telemundo, thanks to Cuban born Rey Rodriguez, including long time weekend news anchor Maria Antonieta Collins, tabloid news anchor Maria Celeste Arraras and sports announcer Andres Cantor. Little effect has taken place as it was proved that they were fine with the replacements of these personalities.

Univision previously overtook the now-defunct English-language networks UPN and the WB, now the CW Television Network as the fifth-most popular network overall, and in the 18-to-34-year-old and 18-to-49-year-old demographics it sometimes ranks higher than that. More advertising on TV is targeted toward those age groups than toward any other part of the viewing audience.

On February 9, 2006 Univision Communications confirmed that it is putting itself up for sale. Rupert Murdoch, chairman of the News Corporation, has stated that his company is considering buying Univision, but has since backed off that position [1]. Other expected bidders announced were Time Warner, CBS, Disney, Grupo Televisa of Mexico (under a partnership due to foreign ownership laws), Bill Gates, and several private equity firms. Tribune Company was rumored to be interested in buying Telefutura. [2]

Then on June 27, 2006, Univision announced that it accepted a $12.7 billion dollar bid from a group of private equity investors led by TPG Capital, L.P. and Thomas H. Lee Partners. The investor group also included Madison Dearborn, Providence Equity and children's television mogul Haim Saban -- founder of Saban Entertainment. This marks Saban's return to broadcast ownership, as Saban (minus partner Shuki Levy) was 50% owner, along with News Corporation, of the Fox Family Channel (now known as the Disney-owned ABC Family Channel). On March 27, 2007, federal regulators approved the sale, and Abercrombie & Fitch took its place on the S&P 500. The delisting of the stock ticker UVN will happen upon closing. ^[1] According to the Los Angeles Times, the deal was closed and the ownership change was made official on that same day. ^[2]

However, Univision's shareholders filed two class-action lawsuit against the company and its board members to stop the buyout. One lawsuit claims that the board members structured the deal to only benefit the company's insiders and not the average stockholders. The other lawsuit was filed on behalf of a shareholder identified as L A Murphy, who claims that the board put its own personal interests and the interests of the winning bidder ahead of shareholders, and also failed to adequately evaluate the company's worth. In the meantime, more lawsuits were filed, one against Univision's records division for heavy handed tactics, and the other from a winner of a "Despierta America" $30,000 makeover contest for breaking its own rules and cancelling the makeover right in the middle of it. [3]

Also, Univision yet again continues to gain broadcast penetration and has done so non-stop since 2004, with stations in Detroit, Michigan, Seattle, Washington, Portland, Oregon, Minneapolis, Minnesota, Nashville, Tennessee, among many others.

[edit] Primetime Schedule

News/News Investigation shows are in red; Reality/Game Shows are in green; Primetime Talk Shows are in blue; Telenovelas are in purple.

	7:00 PM	8:00 PM	9:00 PM	10:00 PM
Sunday	La Hora Pico	Bailando por la Boda de Mis Sueños
Monday	Duelo de Pasiones	La fea más bella	Destilando Amor	Cristina
Tuesday				Ver Para Creer
Wednesday				Don Francisco Presenta
Thursday				Aqui Y Ahora
Friday				Casos de la Vida Real: Edicion Especial (E)
Saturday	Casos de Familia: Edicion Especial	Sábado Gigante

[edit] Shows

Main article: List of programs broadcast by Univisión

Univision's shows include:

Noticiero Univision (Univisión News)
Cristina (talk show hosted by Cristina Saralegui)
Don Francisco's Sábado Gigante (Giant Saturday)
Despierta América (Wake Up America) (morning show)
El Gordo y La Flaca (The Fat Man and the Skinny Girl) (variety/gossip show)
Primer Impacto (First Impact) (newsmagazine)
Republica Deportiva (Sports Republic) (sports show hosted by Fernando Fiore)

Various prime-time telenovelas and specialty shows from Mexico also air. They are edited to fit U.S. as well as Univision broadcast standards. (see below)

[edit] Telenovelas and Other Shows

This article or section contains information about scheduled or expected future events.
It may contain information of a tentative nature and the content may change dramatically as the event approaches and more information becomes available.

Univision has contracts with Venezuela's Venevisión and Mexico's Televisa to showcase some of their novelas and other shows. They are listed by the year in which they first went on the air in their respective countries. On July 6, 2006, Univision and Televisa reached an exclusive program licensing agreement in which the network and its sisters, Telefutura and Galavisión would lose all rights to all programs produced by or for Televisa after 2017, unless a new agreement is reached before then. ^[3] Meanwhile, at this time little is known about Univision's agreement with Venevisión.

[edit] Current Daytime Telenovelas

Eastern / Pacific	Central / Mountain	Title (English Translation)	Distributor(s) (Country, Year)	Cast	First Premiered	Projected / Scheduled Finale
1:00 PM	12:00 PM	El Amor No Tiene Precio (Love Has No Price)	Televisa / Fono Video (Mexico / USA, 2005)	Susana Gonzalez Victor Noriega Eugenia Cauduro Roberto Vander	March 2006	April 6, 2007 (S)
2:00 PM	1:00 PM	Acorralada (Corraled)	Venevisión (Venezuela / USA, 2007)	Alejandra Lazcano David Zepeda Sonya Smith Frances Ondiviela	January 2007	Mid to Late 2007 (P)
3:00 PM	2:00 PM	Las Dos Caras de Ana (The Two Faces of Ana)	Televisa / Fono Video (Mexico / USA, 2006)	Ana Layevska Rafael Amaya Maria Rubio Mauricio Aspe	December 2006	Summer 2007 (P)

[edit] Current Primetime Telenovelas

Eastern / Pacific	Central / Mountain	Title (English Translation)	Distributor(s) (Country, Year)	Cast	First Premiered	Projected / Scheduled Finale
7:00 PM	6:00 PM	Duelo de Pasiones (Passionate Duels)	Televisa (Mexico, 2006)	Pablo Montero Ludwika Paleta Sergio Goyri Erika Buenfil	January 2007	Mid To Late Summer 2007 (P)
8:00 PM	7:00 PM	La Fea Mas Bella (The Most Beautiful Ugly Girl)	Televisa (Mexico, 2006)	Angelica Vale Jaime Camil Elizabeth Álvarez Patricia Navidad	Late Spring 2006	Second Half 2007 (P)
9:00 PM	8:00 PM	Destilando Amor (Distilling of Love)	Televisa (Mexico, 2007)	Eduardo Yáñez Angélica Rivera Sergio Sendel Chantal Andere	March 2007	Early Fourth Quarter 2007 (P)

[edit] Late Night Recurring Titles

Note: This lineup is known as Grandes Historias. Titles presented at 1:00 AM are not shown on Friday Nights. On Fridays, Univision airs Incognito starting at 12 Midnight, followed by La Guereja y Algo Mas at 1:30 AM. All times are Eastern & Pacific.

Eastern / Pacific	Central / Mountain	Days On-Air	Title (English Translation)	Distributor(s) (Country, Year)	Cast	First Began	Projected / Scheduled Finale
1:00 AM	12:00 AM	Mon - Thu	El Privilegio de Amar (The Privilege to Love)	Televisa (Mexico, 1998)	Adela Noriega Rene Strickler Andrés Garcia César Évora	Fourth Quarter 2006	Second Half 2007 (P)
2:00 AM	1:00 AM	Mon - Fri	Tres Mujeres (Three Women)	Televisa (Mexico, 1999 / 2000)	Norma Herrera Erika Buenfil Karyme Lozano Alexis Ayala	March 2006	April 7, 2007 (S)

[edit] Upcoming Titles

Title (English Translation)	Distributor(s) (Country, Year)	Cast	Projected / Scheduled Debut	To Replace (Broadcast Time Slot)
Amar Sin Límites (Love Without Limits)	Televisa (Mexico, 2006)	Karyme Lozano Valentino Lanus Manuela Ímaz Otto Sirgo	Early Fall 2007 (P)	TBA
Código Postal (Postal Code)	Televisa (Mexico, 2006)	Ana Bertha Espín Roberto Blandón Imanol Landeta Altair Jarabo	April 9, 2007 (S)	El Amor No Tiene Precio (at 1 PM ET / 12 N CT)
La Verdad Oculta (The Hidden Truth)	Televisa (Mexico, 2006)	Gabriel Soto Eduardo Yáñez Galilea Montijo Julio Alemán	Summer 2007 (P)	TBA
Lola, Érase Una Vez (Lola, Once Upon a Time)	Televisa / Cris Morena / RGB TV (Mexico / Argentina, 2007)	Eiza Gonzalez Aarón Díaz Blanca Sanchez Lorena Herrera	Second Half 2007 (P)	TBA
Bajo Las Riendas del Amor (Under The Reigns Of Love)	Televisa / Fono Video (Mexico / USA, 2007)	Adriana Fonseca Gabriel Soto Adamari Lopez Victor Camara	Second Half 2007 (P)	TBA
Yo Amo a Juan Querendón (I Love Juan Querendón)	Televisa (Mexico, 2007)	Eduardo Santamarina Mayrin Villanueva Silvia Pasquel Alexis Ayala	Late Summer 2007 (P)	TBA

[edit] Annual Award Ceremonies

Premios Furia Musical (Musical Fury Awards) (Country music awards-style)
Premio Lo Nuestro (Our Awards) (Grammys-style)
Latin Grammy
Premios Juventud (Youth Awards) (Teen Choice Awards-style)
Premios TV y Novelas (TV and Novelas Awards) (emmy's-style)

Univision also shows live soccer matches such as the Football World Cup.

[edit] Univision’s most-viewed shows

Rank	Event	Households	Year
1	Selena ¡VIVE!	35.90	2005
2	Rubí	33.7	2005
3	El Derecho de Nacer	31.6	2002
4	La Fea mas Bella	40.9	2006
5	Rosalinda	30.05	2000
6	Niña Amada Mia	29.7	2003
7	La Madrastra	29	2005

[edit] Other Properties

In addition to the Univision network, Univision Communications owns several other properties. They include:

The Galavisión cable television network.
The TeleFutura broadcast television network.
21 full-power and 9 low-power television stations that air Univision programming.
22 full-power and 15 low-power television stations that air TeleFutura programming.
1 English-language television station, MyNetworkTV affiliate KUVI-TV, Bakersfield, California.
1 Spanish-language Independent station, WSTE in Ponce, Puerto Rico -- operated under a Local Marketing Agreement.
Univision Radio: a group of 47 radio stations throughout the United States and Puerto Rico.
The Univision and Fonovisa record labels, as well as 50% of the Disa record label.
Univision.com (also known as Univision Online), an official website that launched in 2000.