MCNBRIEFS

Karmazin Says Sayonara to Sirius

NEW YORK — Sirius XM CEO Mel Karmazin has informed the company’s board of directors that he will leave the company on Feb. 1, after his current employment contract expires.

Karmazin’s departure is no surprise — he has locked horns with Sirius’ largest shareholder, Liberty Media, and briefly opposed Liberty’s eff orts to take control of the satellite-radio giant. On the company’s second-quarter earnings conference call in August, Karmazin noted that he had not had an enjoyable experience working for someone else at Viacom, but said that he and the board would work out any questions about his employment with Sirius before its scheduled third-quarter earnings call.

Karmazin joined Sirius Satellite Radio in 2004 after a four-year stint as chief operating officer of cable programming giant Viacom. He steered Sirius through its 2008 merger with rival XM Satellite Radio (which created Sirius XM) and helped engineer the $530 million bailout loan in 2009 from Liberty that gave the Denverbased media giant a 40% interest in Sirius XM.

Sirius XM has formed a search committee for Karmazin’s replacement, headed by Liberty CEO Greg Maff ei and including Sirius XM chairman Eddy Hartenstein and Virgin Media chairman James Mooney.

Wave Completes Sale to Oak Hill

KIRKLAND, Wash. — Wave Division Holdings, parent of Seattle-based cable operator Wave Broadband, completed its sale to Oak Hill Capital Partners, GI Partners and a management group last week.

Wave — which has about 385,000 video, voice and data subscribers in suburban areas outside Seattle; San Francisco; Sacramento, Calif.; and Portland, Ore. — had announced the deal in June. In addition to Oak Hill and GI Partners, a group of Wave managers led by CEO Steve Weed also participated in the deal. Terms were not disclosed. RBC Capital Markets and Waller Capital Partners served as financial advisers to Wave; Deutsche Bank and Wells Fargo advised Oak Hill Capital.