The Business

The Univision CEO talks ‘firing’ Donald Trump, how to reverse his ratings slide, the fate of the telenovela and snapping up Gawker sites

- Natalie Jarvey

In June 2015, then-presidential candidate Donald Trump sent a letter to Univision CEO Randy Falco, banning the media exec from his Miami golf resort following the Spanish-language broadcaster’s decision not to air the Miss USA pageant that Trump owned. But if the slight bothered Falco, an avid golfer, he’s not letting on. The letter sits framed in his corner office at Univision’s New York headquarters. And Falco, who has since been invited back to Trump’s resort, remembers with a chuckle how Trump told him, “I was personally hurt by what you did. Because, Randy, you fired me on the air.”

As the mainstream media is struggling with how to cover Trump, Falco, 63, is positioning Univision squarely as an advocate for its mostly Spanish-speaking audience. And at least in the news game, it’s working. Evening news ratings are up 17 percent since January. But the Trump bump can’t entirely save Univision — which is owned by a Haim Saban-led investor group and brought in $846 million during 2016’s fourth quarter — from ratings erosion. In four years, the network lost 48 percent of its primetime demo audience as rival Telemundo became competitive, though Univision remained the top Spanish-language network last season. So Falco, who spent 30 years at NBC, is emphasizing live entertainment and sports while revamping telenovelas for a modern audience.

Falco, who led AOL during the final years of its merger with Time Warner before joining Univision in 2011, also sees a future for digital programming aimed at a multicultural audience. With a long-planned IPO still on hold, the company has been buying up media brands — everything from Gawker to The Onion — to boost a portfolio that includes Fusion, the website and cable network that began as a joint venture with ABC aimed at Latino millennials.