Strong in spite of sale

For the past two weeks, the business and entertainment sectors had been abuzz with discussions regarding the sale of the ABS-CBN compound. Not the whole block, but a great portion of it.

Is this still news? Well, yes and no.

Prior to the pandemic, I had been telling anyone who cared to listen to start investing in properties around the ABS-CBN compound in Quezon City. I even wrote a column about it when I was still part of another media outlet.

About a decade or so ago, there had been plans to convert the ABS-CBN compound into another Rockwell. That’s the reason why ABS-CBN purchased the San Jose del Monte, Bulacan property that had been turned into a broadcast complex. Productions were going to be staged there. Only news programs were to remain in the Quezon City studios.

So, the fact that ABS-CBN was going to be taken out of its present site is no longer news. The twist here is that it is no longer the Lopez-owned Rockwell Land Corporation that will develop this prime real estate property. That a major chunk of the ABS-CBN compound was sold to Ayala Land, Inc. to the tune of P6.24 billion is the big surprise.

Memory lane

These past few days, ABS-CBN talents had been walking down memory lane in their respective social media accounts. Oh, the good old days! Regine Velasquez and Zsa Zsa Padilla even took pictures of themselves by the iconic ABS-CBN transmission tower.

Before condominium buildings started eating into the landscape of Metro Manila, that tower was a landmark in Quezon City. It may look like a less (oh, much less) graceful version of the Eiffel Tower, but that structure is now iconic.

But would you believe that its forefather was simply a steel wire tied between two mango trees in San Juan del Monte? Of course, San Juan del Monte is now simply San Juan City in Metro Manila.

The cradle of ABS-CBN was also in San Juan (then still part of Rizal) — in the Little Baguio neighborhood of Antonio Quirino, regarded as the Father of Philippine Television. It was he who set up the Alto Broadcasting System or ABS. Alto comes from merged names of the Quirino couple, Aleli and Tony.

The CBN — short for Chronicle Broadcasting Network — was added when Eugenio Lopez, Sr. bought ABS from Antonio Quirino. And so, it became ABS-CBN and had been owned by the Lopez family since 1957.

The year 1957 was truly significant for ABS-CBN. It was also during that period when the property that would eventually become the ABS-CBN compound was purchased by Lopezes.

Property matters

The whole block measures 44,027 square meters. It was bought for P14 per square meter and had a lot of potentials.

Since Quezon City was the capital of the Philippines that time, a lot of government offices were being moved to the Quezon Memorial Circle in those days. The future ABS-CBN compound was just a block away from Quezon Avenue, then still known as Quezon Boulevard Extension. It was also near the route going to the UP campus in Diliman.

In less than half a decade, in fact, a lot of fashionable homes began rising in the area. There was the mansion of President Carlos P. Garcia that is now the high-end condo building El Jardin del Presidente.

It was the precast era. Homes being built in what was then Bohol Avenue (now Sgt. Esguerra) were mostly concrete — with precast as a popular adornment. Some of those fabulous structures are still there — precast and all.

ABS-CBN by 1957 was still trying to find its permanent home. And so, it moved from Florentino Torres Street, to Aduana in Intramuros and, later, along a flood-prone area of Roxas Boulevard in Pasay City.

The Lopez family had wanted to build its broadcast complex in Bohol Avenue, but didn’t have the resources yet. The property didn’t lay idle though. It was used as a place to assemble broadcast equipment. A 200-foot transmission tower was even built there for the network’s use.

The present 650-foot tower was erected when the ABS-CBN compound was constructed in February 1967. It was completed in December 1968. With less skilled labor today, a medium-sized home takes longer than that to finish.

The ABS-CBN compound was built after taking out loans. When the network was shut down by martial law in 1972, payments had yet to be completed.

ABS-CBN reopened in 1986. In a couple of years, it was again the No. 1 station in the country — the way it was prior to martial law.

In 1997, ABS-CBN started building the ELJ Communications Center. (ELJ is short for Eugenio Lopez, Jr.) The company took out bank loans once more. Unfortunately, the Asian crisis happened in 1998. The peso was severely devalued and ABS-CBN had to pay its debts in dollars. But as always, ABS-CBN recovered.

The ‘granary’

As businessmen, the Lopezes love investing in areas other than media. Of course, they were sugar planters first — among the most prominent in Iloilo. In

Manila, they went into media. Later, they acquired Meralco, plus other businesses, including banks.

In the 1990s, the family even acquired BayanTel and went into waterworks. They also developed Rockwell in the new millennium.

Some investments did well, but as businesses go, some lost money. But ABS-CBN was always there to subsidize losing ventures. Yes, it was the network that always kept the sister companies afloat. It was the “palabigasan” or granary.

By itself, ABS-CBN would have been fine. All it had to do was put talking heads on TV and turn that into profit. What’s the saying again in the vernacular? “Laway lang ang puhunan (Saliva is the only investment).” Hadn’t that always been the ABS-CBN business mantra?

Of course, ABS-CBN is also legendary for its vision. In the late 1990s, the creative people of the network were already advised to start thinking out of the box because they knew even then that television was on its way out. This was at a time when flat screens had yet to be introduced in the market.

ABS-CBN had long prepared for the changes in platform. It was way ahead of other networks in terms of going digital. Unfortunately, the rug was pulled from under quite prematurely when Congress refused to renew its franchise in 2020.

By the time the network lost its franchise to operate on free TV, the Lopezes had already acquired the 7.7 hectare San Jose del Monte property and had, in fact, built two sound stages there. The reality show Your Moment was actually staged in the Bulacan studios in 2019.

The pandemic and the non-renewal of its franchise, sadly, hit ABS-CBN really bad. A lot of money was lost there. Income from advertising could have helped finance the eight other sound stages that were in the original plan of the ABS-CBN complex in San Jose del Monte.

What happens next?

It is said that the proceeds from the sale of the ABS-CBN compound aren’t enough to cover the company’s financial obligations. Rumor has it that the debts had reached P16 B — although that figure is quite unbelievable.

Could the lack of funding be the reason why the compound was sold to Ayala instead of being developed by Rockwell? There could be another factor. Putting up a condominium and creating a mall would require a lot of permits. Rockwell may just run into unfriendly forces during the construction process. After all, a lot of those who refused to give ABS-CBN a franchise five years ago are still in power. The safest route is to turn over everything to Ayala Land.

So what will happen to ABS-CBN when Ayala Land takes over the property? The ELJ building will remain an ABS-CBN domain. News programs will still be broadcast from there and, perhaps, It’s Showtime and ASAP. The soaps, as originally planned, will use the San Jose del Monte sound stages.

ABS-CBN may now be facing a major setback, but as it had proven in the past, expect this media giant to be big again. At the moment, it is doing very well creating content — with Batang Quiapo and Incognito ahead in the ratings game.

Originally, there were only three basic needs: food, clothing and shelter. But since man no longer has to hunt for his food, he now has plenty of time on his hands. And so, there is a fourth need: Entertainment — to keep man from getting bored.

This is where ABS-CBN comes in. For as long as there is need for entertainment, ABS-CBN will be there to provide it.