Telemundo's history is marked by an initial period of expansion followed by instability, changing ownership, and increasing diversification. Telemundo Group, Inc. first emerged on the television radar in 1986 under the control of investors Saul Steinberg and Henry Sil­verman of Reliance Capital Group. Steinberg and Sil­verman were enticed by the growth potential of the Hispanic market and initially invested in a number of television stations directly serving that market. The first two stations acquired by the investors, and used as the foundation for Telemundo, were WSCU in Miami and KWAQ in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Following these initial purchases, the company quickly expanded by taking over WNJU in Linden, New Jersey, as well as KTMD in the important Texas market of Houston/ Galveston. It also established affiliations with Chicago station WSNS, and KVDA in San Antonio. According to Patricia Constantakis-Valdes, in the period between 1988 and 1991, Telemundo expanded even further, with stations and affiliates in Dallas/Ft. Worth, Lubbock, Albuquerque, Tucson, Phoenix, and Yakima in Washington.

     The network's programming during this period stayed fairly close to the format established by Univision: news, sports, variety shows, talk shows, and tabloid news shows. The network also scheduled telenovelas- the staple of Spanish-language programs ming-mostly imported from Mexico, Venezuela, and Brazil. One particularly important telenovela, however, was Angelica Mi Vida, produced in Puerto Rico and based on the lives of Hispanic Americans. Additionally, the nightly news segment, Noteciero Telemundo, was produced in Hialeah, Florida (the location of the network's corporate headquarters). This emphasis on shows produced in the U.S. and targeting a specifically Hispanic identity has continued to sit at the tumultuous center of Telemundo's programming strategies.

     Following the initial period of growth, Joaquin F. Blaya, who had previously served as president and CEO of Univision, took over the same post at Telemundo. With Blaya at the helm, Telemundo continued to expand its holdings and increase its emphasis on young Hispanic viewers. During this time, Telemundo, Univision, and Nielson Media Research developed a ratings system specifically designed to chart the viewing habits of the Hispanic community in the U.S. Continuous expansion and investment without the benefit of comparably increasing advertising revenue, how­ ever, led to a financial collapse in July 1993, and the network filed for bankruptcy.

     As detailed by Alex Avila, Telemundo was resuscitated in 1994 when Leon Black and his company, Apollo Advisors L.P., purchased the network for $83 million. Shortly thereafter, Joaquin Blaya resigned his position and Roland Hernandez took over as President and CEO. Under Hernandez, Telemundo arranged for access to telenovelas from TV Azteca, the largest independent network in Mexico--a move that would ease the burden of costly U.S.-based production. This move also allowed the network new competitive leverage with Univision, whose exclusive deals with production and export giants Televisa (Mexico) and Venvision (Venezuela) had previously crippled Telemundo's access to relatively inexpensive Spanish-language programming sources outside the U.S. As a result, Telemundo's programming continued to look like that of Univision, despite continued efforts to differentiate itself and pursue younger viewers. Patricia Constantakis-Valdes indicates that, as of 1995, Tele­mundo's programming consisted mostly of movies and telenovelas, but still included game shows, talk shows, variety shows, sports, and news. As with Univision, approximately half of this programming was being produced in the U.S. By 1996. Telemundo's advertising revenues had increased by over 20 percent from the previous year.

     But competing with Univision proved no simple task, and access to TV Azteca's programs was no cure for deeper problems at the network. Univision's dominance was, in large part, a matter of habit and familiarity for a large number of older viewers, and no injection of like-minded programming was going to undo a more than two-decade head start. Furthermore, the Mexico­ produced telenovelas from TV Azteca failed to connect with younger viewers who found them increasingly irrelevant to their own experience. Despite the increased ad revenues, Telemundo's share of the Hispanic audience continued to drop, from 37 percent in 1993 to 18 percent in 1996. As ratings failed to rise, advertisers began to abandon the network, and by 1997, Telemundo was in dire straits again. In an effort to stem the tide of advertiser attrition and to give the ratings a boost, Telemundo decided to change direction and counter­ program against Univision, removing telenovelas and replacing them with nightly feature films, and moving their news an hour earlier to avoid direct competition. At the same time, the network began actively to seek out potential investors and programming partners. Interested groups included syndication giant King World Productions, Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation, and Sony Pictures Entertainment.

     In November 1997, Sony teamed up with Liberty Media, Apollo Management, and Bastion Capital Fund to purchase Telemundo for $539 million. Apollo retained 50 percent ownership while Sony and Liberty, because of regulatory restrictions, each held a 25 per­ cent share. The deal received FCC approval in July 1998. The immediate effects of this transition were the removal of Roland Hernandez as president and CEO, a programming overhaul that included radical counter­ programming strategies, and a growing fear that the network would be assimilated into the mold of one of the U.S. networks.

     Hernandez was replaced by Peter Tortorici in August 1998. Tortorici was a veteran of U.S. television with experience at the network level, having served as an executive in CBS's entertainment division. The programming  overhaul  also betrayed  a move toward the U.S. network model. Under the direction of a new president of entertainment, Nely Galan, Telemundo mounted a campaign designed to court the younger, bi­ lingual Hispanic audience. As Galan herself stated in November 1998: "Our projection is all about Latinos in the U.S. It's not about Latin Americans." The result of this strategy was a greater emphasis on U.S.­ produced programs and a focus on the genres that drive English-language television: sitcoms, action­ adventure series, reality shows, talk shows, and game shows. Emphasizing the bi-cultural slant of this strategy, the network's motto during this period was "The Best of Two Worlds."

     For the 1998-99 season, Tortorici and Galan over­ saw the scheduling of a number of series that were essentially Spanish-language re-makes of once-popular U.S. hits, the licenses for which were, not coincidentally, owned by Sony. These shows included: Angeles (Charlie's Angels), Solo En America (One Day at a Time), Reyes y Rey (Starsky and Hutch or Miami Vice), Una Familia con Angel (Who's The Boss?), Los Re­cien Casados (The Newlywed Game), and Buscando Pareja (The Dating Game). Additionally, the network experimented with English subtitles and programs in "Spanglish."

     These counter-programming moves initially helped boost the ratings, but only for a short period. As soon as the novelty of the effort wore away, network affiliates began to report precipitous drops in their audience share. In July 1999, Tortorici was replaced by James McNamara (born and raised in Panama), and Telemundo unceremoniously dropped most of the remakes from the schedule. McNamara returned telenovelas to the center of the network's programming strategy, taking advantage of a new production deal with TV Azteca (negotiated by Tortorici before his departure). The network also purchased CBS/teleNoticias, a Spanish and Portuguese news network. As McNamara stated: "We feel there are a few fundamental building blocks or pillars to building our business; novelas, news, sports, and variety/comedy shows." He also insisted on a return to strictly Spanish-language programming. Nely Galan also left the network in 1999.

     Despite the network's movement back toward more traditional and proven programming, Telemundo has continued to move forward as well, diversifying its holdings and growing as a media corporation under McNamara. The network controls Telemundo Cable, which owns two cable networks: Telemundo International, and Mun2. In keeping with long-held desires to capture the youth market, Mun2 targets 18-34 year old viewers with a steady diet of music videos, entertainment shows, young dramas, comedies, movies, and game shows. Telemundo Cable also distributes Videorola, a Mexico-based music video channel.

     But the network's growth, as the Sony  purchase in­dicated, is in turn part of other diversification strategies as well. In 2000, NBC purchased Telemundo from Sony for nearly $2 billion. The once autonomous Spanish-language network  has  now  been  folded into NBC's own growth strategy as it eyes the increasingly lucrative Latino market. That market currently accounts for almost 13 percent of the entire U.S. population and is expected to continue to be the fastest-growing population group in the United States for many years to come.

     One of the major fears in the Hispanic media market following Sony's purchase of the network was that the relationship between Spanish-language television networks and the Hispanic communities they served would be irrevocably altered: that conglomeration would adversely affect the identity of the Spanish­ language networks themselves and thus reduce their effectiveness in serving the Hispanic community. And while Telemundo seems to have regained a solid footing in the Hispanic media market thanks to its own diversification strategies, the future of its programming under NBC's guiding hand remains to be seen.