New England Sports Ventures

From SoSH

In February 2002, The New York Times partnered with John Henry, paying $75 million for a 17% interest in New England Sports Ventures, the holding company for the Red Sox, Fenway Park, and the Sox 80% interest in NESN. Subsequently, nesn.com was merged with the sports section of boston.com.

Note that the purchase price implies that approximately $440 million of the purchase was funded with equity, and the rest with debt.

According to a Boston Globe story on 1/19/07 link, partner David D'Alessandro sold his stake for 2.2x what he paid for it. Assuming that the debt level is even to where it was when the team was purchased at about $300m, that would place the valuation of NESV at approximately $1.1B (not the $1.5B quoted in the Globe article).