Tribune Co. Reorganizes Execs In Face Of Lender Probing

When we last left Sam Zell, owner of the Tribune Co., he was challenging the objections of senior lenders to retain the exclusive right to reorganize his company's structure and take it out of Chapter 11, where its been for almost a year. Now it looks like Zell is taking matters into his own hands and starting the reorganization process already. Yesterday, several executives were shuffled around the company, including Gerry Spector's move to COO of Tribune Co. from chief administrative officer, and CFO Chandler Bigelow's expansion of his role to include financial operations in publishing and human resources. Nils Larsen was also named CIO "effective immediately." Press release after the jump Read More: Tribune Co. reorganizes executives, names Gerry Spector chief operating officer --Chicago Tribune Previously: Tribune Co.'s No Good, Very Bad Week Tribune Company Appoints Gerry Spector as Chief Operating Officer; CFO Chandler Bigelow Expands Duties Released December 10, 2009 Nils Larsen Named Chief Investment Officer Tribune Company today announced the appointment of Gerry Spector as Chief Operating Officer, effective immediately. Spector, who has served as Tribune's Chief Administrative Officer since December 2007, will now oversee the company's internet, broadcasting and newspaper operations. "Gerry has led the ongoing transformation of this company from top to bottom," said Randy Michaels, Tribune's Chief Executive Officer. "He's strategically refocused the operations of our business units so that we're more innovative and more efficient than ever before, he's streamlined the decision-making process and he's helped drive the reorganization of our sales operation. From the beginning, Gerry's been a great partner for me." During the past two years Tribune has redesigned all of its newspapers, increased local broadcast news programming, expanded the market share of its TV stations, grown the audience of WGN America by almost 40%, begun rebuilding its sales organization, and reduced expenses by approximately $600 million. "We've accomplished a lot, but we can do even more," said Spector. "This is a great company, with outstanding brands and talented employees. We plan to reinvent our media organization every day -- we're committed to delivering high-quality content, providing innovative solutions to our advertisers and competing for every available dollar." The company also announced that SVP/Chief Financial Officer Chandler Bigelow is expanding his responsibilities to include the financial operations of the publishing division and all centralized human resources operations. Bigelow has been with Tribune since 1998 and served as SVP/CFO since March 2008. Finally, Tribune has named Nils Larsen as Chief Investment Officer effective immediately. Larsen will oversee company-wide business development and investment opportunities. Larsen joined the company in December 2008 and has been responsible for helping spearhead Tribuneâ€™s restructuring efforts.

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Tribune Co. Reorganizes Execs In Face Of Lender Probing

Drew Grant

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