By: Mark Fitzgerald William C. Pate, a new director of the now-private Tribune Co., has taken a minority interest in Chairman and CEO Sam Zell's stake in the Chicago media giant, the company disclosed in a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing.
Pate, 44, is chief investment officer of Zell's Equity Group Investments real estate business. Zell engineered the $8.2 billion deal to take Tribune private through an employee stock ownership plan. For his investment of $315 million, Zell is getting warrants that eventually will give him the right to buy 40% of Tribune.
Pate is the second newly appointed director to take a stake in Zell's investment. Tribune announced when it went private Dec. 20 that Brian Greenspun, editor and president of the Las Vegas Sun and chairman of Greenspun Corp., had made "a significant investment" in Tribune.
The SEC filing did not disclose the size of either director's investment. It said each acquired his interest through separate limited liability companies for which each "serves as the sole economic member."
Zell at a Dec. 20 press conference said Greenspun's investment was "appropriate, but the preponderance of the capital invested is mine."
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