Another Media Company Selling Assets: Scripps Seeks Buyer for uSwitch

The New York Times Co. (NYSE:NYT) isn't the only media company with an asset hitting the block. Scripps Network Interactive Inc. (NYSE:SNI) has hired investment bank Allen & Co. to assist in the Cincinnati-based media company's search for a buyer for uSwitch, a British online price comparison engine.

Scripps Network's former parent E.W. Scripps Co. (SSP) purchased uSwitch Ltd. in 2006 for $366 million in cash. At the time of the deal, uSwitch had raised at least three rounds of venture funding, according to The Deal Pipeline (subscription required). The uSwitch deal had followed E.W. Scripps' 2005 acquisition of Los Angeles-based shopping search engine Shopzilla Inc. for $525 million in cash.

Since the bevy of Internet purchases, E.W. Scripps packaged its cable TV channels, which include HGTV and Food Network, with Shopzilla and other Internet assets to form Scripps Network, which was spun out as a separate company in 2007.

Scripps Network indicated the sale of uSwitch will have no bearing on its U.S. e-commerce related Internet assets Shopzilla and Bizrate. In other words, Scripps Network is simply retreating from the British market, for now.

The New York Times grabbed headlines Wednesday morning with the announcement it had hired GoldmanSachs & Co. to sell The Boston Globe, which it had bought for $1.1 billion in 1993. One thing looks certain for both media companies: Neither will get nearly what they paid for the assets.

- Matthew Wurtzel

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