Sunraysia Television

Sunraysia Television was a publicly listed company which owned Channel Nine Perth's parent company Swan Television and Radio Broadcasters from 1989 to 2007. In its last years before delisting from the ASX in December 2007, Sunraysia was majority owned by Eva Presser's Sabtel, with 48.94% of the company's stock.^[1] WIN Corporation owned another 43.65% of shares.^[2]

History

Sunraysia Television has its origins in the area around Mildura, known as Sunraysia. It operated a single television licence, STV-8. In 1985, the station was purchased by Eva Presser.^[3]

In 1989, Sunraysia acquired Channel Nine Perth from Bond Media who were forced to sell due to cross-media ownership laws which restricted audience reach. They paid A$95 million for the station and as part of the deal sold STV-8, to Bond Media for $18 million, which was then onsold to ENT Ltd. for the same price. Sunraysia Television no longer had any assets in the Sunraysia region.^[4][5]

In 1994, following a failed takeover bid for Sunraysia, Kerry Stokes sold his 21.2 per cent stake to Bruce Gordon's WIN Corporation which already held 19.9 per cent. Mrs Presser was quoted as calling the Stokes bid "uninvited, unnecessary, unwanted, unspectacular" and that her rejection of the bid was "unequivocal".^{[6] [2]}

Selling of Nine Perth

In February 2007, PBL Media announced that it would acquire 100% of Swan Television and Radio Broadcasters from Sunraysia for $136.4 million. However, after protest from WIN Corporation owner Bruce Gordon, who offered Sunraysia a revised $163.1 million, it was announced months later on 21 April that the board of Sunraysia would now endorse WIN's revised offer. ^[7] The sale went though on 8 June 2007.^[8]

Sunraysia & the Pressers

Eva's husband Dan is executive chairman of family company, Sabrands. Sabrands runs the Sunraysia Natural Beverages company, which similarly has no ties to the Sunraysia region, and since 2013 has owned the iconic Rosella business. The Pressers use Sunraysia as their personal brand name, which some may see as ironic given the name was also used in a 1920s dried fruit advertising campaign, for the Australian Dried Fruits Association - an entity with no connection to the Pressers.

References