• by David Goetzl , June 27, 2006

NBC is virtually finished with its upfront business, and through a combination of selling more inventory and leveraging its new prime-time NFL package, is expected to pull in the same revenue--about $1.9 billion--as last year, despite ratings tumbles and attendant CPM drops, an industry source said.

NBC was expected to sell about 71 percent of its inventory--up from the 67 percent range last year, the source said.

NBC's CPMs--which were in the $30 range and topped the market--dropped about 5 percent this year, which would now place them in the $28.50 range.

With increases in the 2 percent range, Fox is believed to now have the highest CPMs among the Big 4 networks--in the $31 range. CBS is believed to now be approaching the declining NBC--with ABC still in fourth place, even with increases this year.

Those projections are based on market insight provided by News Corp. President-COO Peter Chernin several weeks ago. Chernin said that going into the upfront, Fox and NBC led the market with CPMs in the $30 range, followed by CBS at $27 and ABC in the $24 to $25 range.