Southern Cross Austereo

Southern Cross Media

The company owned several regional radio stations, as a result of takeovers of stations formerly owned by DMG Radio Australia and RG Capital Radio Network. The company also owned the stations forming the Southern Cross Television and Southern Cross Ten networks around regional Australia and Tasmania, which hold varying affiliations with the Seven Network and Network Ten.

In December 2009, MMG security holders voted in favour of a conversion from a triple-stapled structure to a single ASX-listed company. MMG was renamed Southern Cross Media Group with former RG Capital Radio CEO Rhys Holleran as the Chief Executive Officer.

Austereo

The company was founded by Paul Thompson, and when commercial FM broadcasting was introduced into Australia it acquired the licence for metropolitan Adelaide, South Australia; SAFM commenced transmission in late 1980. The next station to join the network was FOX FM in Melbourne, Victoria in 1986, eventually to be followed by 2Day FM in Sydney, New South Wales and 4BK in Brisbane, Queensland for which the company was successful in converting to the FM band in 1990. Austereo also purchased AM radio station 6IX in Perth, Western Australia with the intention of converting the station to FM. 6IX, which had been re-launched by Austereo as The Eagle 1080 AM, was consequently sold off after being outbid for either of the two new FM licences by rivals 6KY and 6PM, which Austereo now own.

The mid-1990s saw a monopolistic arrangement take place whereby Village Roadshow purchased the Hoyts owned Triple M network, and Triple M in turn merged with Austereo to form a single umbrella company. The merger was part of a single deal that was unpopular due to the fierce rivalry between the two radio networks, and the fact that Village Roadshow and Hoyts were also direct competitors in the film industry.

Merger

In March 2011, Southern Cross Media launched a A$714 million takeover bid of national radio broadcaster, the Austereo Group. On 6 April 2011 shareholders of the Austereo Group accepted the takeover bid, giving SCM a more than 90% share in the company. Southern Cross Media and Austereo merged in July 2011 to form Southern Cross Austereo.

On 23 August 2012, Guy Dobson (director of metro radio) was announced as Chief Officer of Content for the Southern Cross Austereo network, working across radio and television.

Television

Radio

The format of each station is defined by one of two common formats:

Agreements were reached between Southern Cross Austereo, DMG and Prime Television to ensure that existing brand names owned by DMG Radio in regional markets could continue to be used by both Southern Cross Austereo and Prime.

Radio

Southern Cross Austereo produces its own networked programming across both brands, which include:

Some of its stations picked up the Continuous Call Team when Broadcast Operations Group could not resolve broadcast rights issues with 2GB and the National Rugby League. The most notable was KOFM in Newcastle, who also picked up rights to cover games of the Newcastle Knights.

Television news

SCA provides regional television news on the stations owned by the company, which varies between the various markets - with full services in Tasmania and western South Australia, and short basic updates in Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and the ACT.

TNT in Tasmania have their daily bulletins produced from the station's Launceston studios. Much of the network's output, including full bulletins on GTS/BKN, and news summaries broadcast on Seven Network affiliates QQQ and TND, Network Ten affiliate NRN, and O&O Nine Network affiliates as well as TDT in Tasmania, is produced from the network's headquarters and presentation facilities in the Canberra suburb of Watson. The current news director is Alison Drower.

Former presenters

2Day FM hoax call recipient's suspected suicide

As part of a hoax call to the King Edward VII's Hospital Sister Agnes treating the wife of Prince William for acute morning sickness in the critical first trimester of pregnancy, 2Day DJs – Mike Christian and Mel Greig – purported to be the Queen and the Prince of Wales. An experienced 46-year-old nurse, Jacintha Saldanha, took the call. During the call, she and colleagues were conned into revealing sensitive details regarding the patient's condition.

The nurse was found dead the following morning in a suspected suicide at the hospital where she worked.

There is some disagreement over the legality of the incident, with the hospital expressing concern that the incident may have broken the law and Rhys Holleran, the chief executive of 2Day FM's parent company Southern Cross Austereo, stating he was confident that was not the case.

At a Federal Court hearing it became known that Australian media watchdog Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) had prepared a confidential, preliminary report saying that the Radio Royal hoax 'broke law'. 2Day FM acted illegally by airing the phone call without consent.

2Day FM handling of child rape victim

In 2009, 2Day FM were ordered to provide increased protection for children after a 14-year-old girl was attached to a lie detector on the Kyle and Jackie O Show and pressured into discussing her sex life live on air. The radio show host, Kyle Sandilands, encouraged both the girl and her mother to discuss whether she was sexually active, to which the girl responded: "I've already told you the story of this and don't look at me and smile because it's not funny. Oh, okay. I got raped when I was 12 years old." To which Kyle replied: "Right. And is that, is that the only experience you've had?"

Syndicated news and programming

One major criticism of the regional stations owned by Southern Cross Austereo is its reliance on networking news and also programs outside of breakfast from one of four networking centres:

Queensland

1. 4GC has a translator on 765 kHz in Hughenden

New South Wales

1. Translators for The River on 90.1 MHz in Omeo and 96.5 MHz in Corryong. There is also a translator for Star FM in Corryong on 95.7 MHz.
2. Translators on 100.7 MHz (2PQQ) and 102.3 MHz (2ROX) in Port Macquarie.

Australian Capital Territory

1. A joint venture of 50/50 ownership exists in Canberra with the Australian Radio Network where Southern Cross Austereo programmes 104.7 and ARN programmes Mix 106.3 and manages administration for both stations. Despite being part of ARN's KIIS Network, Southern Cross Austereo considers Mix 106.3 to be part of the Triple M LocalWorks network.

Victoria

1. Re-transmitter at 97.9 MHz FM in Traralgon.
2. The actual 3SR call sign and frequency (1260 kHz AM) is now owned by, and is a full-time simulcast of, horse and greyhound racing station 3UZ "Sport 927" from Melbourne.

Western Australia

1. 6TZ also re-transmitted via 1134 kHz AM in Collie (6CI, now listed by ACMA under 6TZ), and 756 kHz AM in Busselton and the Margaret River region.

New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory

Northern Territory and Remote Areas of Eastern Australia

Queensland

South Australia

Victoria

Tasmania

1. Southern Cross has a monopoly on commercial television in this market. The services other than GTS and BKN are retransmissions from Adelaide with local advertising.
2. This station was launched as a digital-only service, co-owned by the two existing commercial broadcasters in the market.

Digital Radio

Southern Cross Austereo broadcasts a number of digital only radio stations, including:

Former:

Former owned and operated stations

Due to conditions placed upon the takeover of DMG Radio's regional stations in 2005, Maqcuarie Southern Cross Media had to sell these stations to other parties:

Further, due to conditions triggered by the purchase of the assets of Southern Cross Broadcasting, Macquarie Media Group was required to sell further stations to meet further diversity requirements at the time; the transactions to satisfy this being completed on 2008-03-14:

Southern Cross Austereo was made to sell 91.9 Sea FM and 92.7 Mix FM on the Sunshine Coast, due to the larger than allowed overlap between the stations' licence area and that of Brisbane. In 2013, the two stations were sold to Eon Broadcasting.