Uforia Audio Network


Uforia Audio Network, is the radio broadcasting and music events division of Univision Communications. Formerly known as Hispanic Broadcasting Corporation and Univision Radio, it is the eighth-largest radio broadcaster in the United States, and the largest specifically catering to Hispanic and Latino Americans. The company is headquartered in Los Angeles.

History

Univision, previously known as Hispanic Broadcasting Corp. and Heftel Broadcasting Corp, was the result of a February 14, 1997 merger of Tichenor Media System, Inc. a private company based in Dallas, Texas and Heftel Broadcasting, a public company based in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Tichenor had been in broadcasting since the 1940s. McHenry Tichenor operated a station in Harlingen, Texas. In 1950, they added KUNO Corpus Christi, Texas. Later station purchases were KIFN in Phoenix, Arizona; WGMA in Hollywood, Florida; & WACO-AM-FM and TV in Waco, Texas. In 1975, the company added KCOR and KQXT in San Antonio.
In 1981, the grandson of the founder, McHenry T. Tichenor, Jr., was named president of the company. He began focusing on its Spanish Language stations; Waco, Hollywood, and Phoenix were sold to their local managers. In 1987 Tichenor bought WOJO, a Spanish-language FM station serving Chicago. In 1984, the company sold KQXT in San Antonio to Westinghouse's Group W Broadcasting and purchased KLAT in Houston, Texas from Marcos Rodriguez, Sr. and Marcos A. Rodriguez. The KLAT purchase gave Tichenor access to top Spanish Radio talents Chuck Brooks, Ricardo del Castillo and Gary Stone. In 1985, WIND, Chicago and KYSR AM-FM El Paso were purchased. More stations were purchased in the following years, and the home office moved from Harlingen to Dallas, Texas. Mac Tichenor, Jr.'s brother, Warren, became general manager of the San Antonio stations in 1991.
Heftel Broadcasting was founded by Cecil Heftel, whose family and in-laws all had been in the broadcasting business. His Heftel Broadcasting in the 1950s and early 1960s was anchored by KIMN in Denver and KGMB AM and KGMB-TV in Honolulu. He added numerous large AM radio stations and some promising FM stations before selling them in the seventies and eighties. Cecil Heftel was elected as a congressman representing Hawaii's first district in 1976; he would hold that office eleven years before resigning in 1987. During this time, his company was active, buying and selling stations in places like Indianapolis and Chicago. For about a year, Heftel and Scott Ginsburg merged their holdings into H & G Communications.
In the early 90s, Heftel began to expand into more Spanish stations, and took steps to go public. Heftel had a knack for making coalitions work, at least for a time, as in the H & G attempt. Heftel set up shop in Miami with local stations WAQI and WRTO, taking a minority interest. Heftel set up Rodriguez-Heftel Texas broadcasting along with Marcos A. Rodriguez. Stations were purchased outright in Los Angeles, Chicago, Las Vegas, and New York.
When HBC went public, Clear Channel Communications invested, taking in several steps up to a 20% interest. In 1996 Clear Channel tendered the shares owned by Heftel management. This got them about 62% of the company. They struck a deal to merge the new company with Tichenor Media, to be run by the Tichenor management. The deal closed in early 1997, and made for the first national Spanish Language broadcasting company.
The new company was worth $1 billion at closing and owned 38 stations. Holding were expanded for the next several years. San Francisco was added in 1996. Phoenix was added in 1999. Fresno in 2000.
Besides buying stations, the company has developed a capacity for improving and expanding stations to enhance coverage. VP of Engineering Mark Stennett oversees this effort along with Charles Staples of Staples Technical Services, Dallas, Texas. For example, 104.9 KAMA-FM in the Houston, Texas area moved from a smaller class A at Rosenberg, Texas to a larger class C3 licensed to Missouri City, Texas. Coverage went from a few hundred thousand to millions. Rating and value increased proportionally. June 25, 2008. This will allow an increase from 2,700 watts to 8,700 watts. The station will also move from a downtown building roof to the company owned KLTN tower.
May 2013: KAMA-FM has increased power to 10.5 kW. Other expanded and relocated stations include KFLC, KESS-FM and KDXX in the Dallas-Ft. Worth area, KBBT and KGSX in the San Antonio area, KLQV San Diego, and WADO New York. KKMR in the Phoenix, AZ area was recently granted a CP to change from class A to class C3, at a new site that will allow a 10 fold increase in its population covered. This app was started nearly a decade ago and was granted based on tweaks in the application done in 2006. Former CFO Jeff Hinson observed once that the station upgrade activity had increased the company's enterprise value by "almost $1 billion".
In 1999, the company created a new entity, HBCI, Inc which was its interactive online presence. HBCi created a network of bilingual radio station web sites and a network of bilingual local city guide sites focused on the local Hispanic consumer in each of the markets the radio stations operated. HBCI achieved the rare milestone of reaching profitability in the dotcom industry just prior to the merger with Univision.
The company traded on the NASDAQ exchange under the symbol HBCCA. It moved to the New York Stock Exchange in May 2000. Stock traded as HSP.
In mid-2002, Univision and HBC voted to merge. The approval process was long and controversial. The deal was approved and closed on September 22, 2003.
After the merger of HBC and Univision, the division was renamed Univision Radio and Denver Colorado.
In 2013, Univision launched Uforia, a new streaming platform featuring the Univision Radio stations and other exclusive content relating to Latino music.
On March 5, 2019, Univision announced that it would re-launch the Uforia brand, and that the Univision Radio group had been officially renamed Uforia Audio Network. There are also plans to use the Uforia brand more extensively across platforms, including live events, as well as television programming.
Some of the syndicated shows in the Uforia Audio Network include "El Show De Raul Brindis", “El Bueno, La Mala y El Feo”, "El Show de Omar y Argelia”, "El Frey Guey Show", "La Chula Y La Bestia' “El Hit Parade de América con Javier Romero”, "Todo Deportes con Broderick Zerpa", and “Intimo con Alberto Sardiñas”.

List of Radio stations

Below is a list of radio stations that are currently owned by Univision. As of November 28, 2018, it owns 61 radio stations; 49 local stations in 15 different markets and the other 12 as national stations.
Each section is in order by call sign

Arizona

Phoenix
Fresno
Los Angeles
San Diego
San Francisco
Miami
Chicago
Las Vegas
New York City
San Juan
Ponce
Mayagüez
Austin
Dallas/Fort Worth
Houston
McAllen
San Antonio