The debt Connoisseur Media took on in its Alpha Media acquisition is reshaping who can invest in the combined company. The FCC approved the broadcaster’s request to allow up to 100% foreign equity ownership, clearing a path around a cap that pending transactions threatened to trigger.
Radio Ink first reported on the petition for Connoisseur Media Holdco, Inc., the company’s controlling US parent for its FCC licenses, earlier this year.
The Media Bureau’s Audio Division ruling specifically approves three foreign parties to each hold more than 5% of Connoisseur’s equity: two Cayman Islands-based Falcon Strategic Partners entities and United Kingdom citizen Oliver Price. Price’s approval includes a “deemed” 100% voting interest tied to a technical FCC attribution rule for uninsulated LLC members, not actual control of the company.
Falcon CM Holdings holds a 29% equity stake in Connoisseur Cos, a parent company of CM Holdco, through convertible notes that could convert to additional equity, one of the two transactions in question. Former Alpha Media shareholders and investors who received warrants as part of Connoisseur’s 2025 acquisition of that company make up the other: those warrant holders currently control 8.75% of Connoisseur Media Parent, and some are foreign entities.
Exercised together, the two transactions could push Connoisseur’s aggregate foreign equity ownership to between 30.50% and 34.38%, according to the ruling.
In its petition, CM Holdco argued the added flexibility would “incentivize foreign investment in broadcasting, and promote US trade policy by encouraging reciprocal investment opportunities for US companies in foreign markets.” The company also pointed to the FCC’s prior approval of up to 100% foreign ownership for Alpha Media’s stations, granted under a similar Cayman Islands and United Kingdom investor structure before Connoisseur’s acquisition.
Connoisseur CEO Jeff Warshaw continues to hold 100% of Connoisseur’s actual voting interests and both de facto and de jure control of the licensees, according to the ruling.
The Department of Justice, reviewing on behalf of the interagency Committee for the Assessment of Foreign Participation in the US Telecommunications Services Sector, told the FCC in April that formal referral for further national security review was unnecessary.
No party filed opposition.
