IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE

DAVIS BROADCASTING OF

ATLANTA

, L.L.C.

,

Defendant, Counter

- Plaintiff

Below

- Appellant,

v.

CHARLOTTE BROADCAST ING,

LLC

, et al.

,

Plaintiffs, Counter

- Defendants

Below

- Appellees. § § § § § § § § § § § § § No. 450, 2015

Court Below: Superior Court

of the State of Delaware

C.A. No. N13C

- 04

- 143 (CCLD)

Submitted: March 2 , 2016

Decided: March 4 , 2016

Before STRINE , Chief Justice; HOLLAND and VALIHURA

, Justices.

O R D E R

This 4th day of March 2016, having considered this matter on the briefs and

after oral argument, it appears to the Court that:

(1) This appeal raises complicated issue s of contract interpretation. But if

the Superior Court’s determination that the Radio One entities’ right t o terminate

under the Asset Exchange Agreement (the “Agreement”) existed u ntil the actual

date that the facilities modification applications (the “FMAs”) and engineering

exhibits (the “ Engineering Exhibits”) were filed was correct, the remaining issues

,

fo r the most part, need not be addressed. As a result of that ruling, the Superior2

Court granted the Radio One entities’ motion for summary judgment , concluding

that they had a valid right to terminate the Agreement because they did so before

the FMAs and E ngineering Exhibits were actually filed . Davis now argues that the

Superior Court was wrong to grant summary judgment and that the contract could

be read differently.

(2) After a careful review of the record, we find no basis on which a jury

coul d find that Davis’s position

— w hich is that the parties agreed to extend the date

on which the FMAs and accompanying Engineering Exhibits could be filed but did

not agree to simultaneously extend the linked right for a party to review those

documents and terminat e the Agreement if those documents “were not acceptable

in its sole discretion ”

— is a reasonable reading of the relevant contract. 1 The

Superior Court properly focused upon the key termination provision , § 15.1, which

used the words “ date of filing ” to describe when the termination right would

expire, and not the term “Filing Date” defined in § 2.6 and used in other provision s

of the contract

. 2 Although not dispositive, that intentional choice must incline the

interpretative process toward giving th e distinct usage meaning. 3

1 App. to Opening Br. at 61 (Asset Exchange Agreement § 15.1).

2 Id.

3 See Martin Marietta Materials, Inc. v. Vulcan Materials Co. , 56 A.3d 1072, 1137 (Del. Ch. 2012) (“Marietta’s reading would force a strained interpretation of the [nondisclosure agreement], which consistently refers to Evaluation Material as a defined term when it chooses to reference it.”); Mehiel v. Solo Cup Co.

, 2005 WL 1252348, at *5 (Del. Ch. May 13, 2005) (limiting defined term to its express meaning and explaining that if the plaintiff wanted the term to mean something else, “he should have contracted for it”).3

(3 ) Most important, Davis has not explained why if the parties extended

“the date of filing” of the FMAs and the Engineering Exhibits

, that extension did

not also extend the linked termination right. Davis ’s parol evidence do es not

rationally support that reading of the contract, and in fact evidence from its own

keyboards cuts strongly against that. 4 Put simply, Davis has not produced any

evidence that would support a jury finding that the parties agreed to extend the date

o f filing for the purpose of actually filing the documents, but somehow did not

extend the linked right of termination. That is not surprising because the bespoke

paragraph in which the termination right is linked to the Engineering Exhibits

plainly contem

plates the ability of a party to review those documents and

determine that they were acceptable before proceeding with the contract’s

performance. 5

(4) Finally, the Superior Court was correct in determining that a party’s

duty to use commercially reasonable efforts under § 8.4(a) did not arise until the

4 See App. to Opening Br. at 373 (Email from Dav is’s broker Mark Jorgenson to Radio One’s Chief Administrative Officer Linda Vilardo, Oct. 5, 2011) (“We share your priorities and look forward to setting a mutually

- acceptable filing date.”).

5 Davis’s argument that the term “Filing Date” in § 2.6 of the Agreement must mean the same thing as “the date of filing” in § 15.1 therefore has another flaw. If the parties agreed that the Filing Date would not be as set forth by the formula in § 2.6 and would be deferred into the future, under Davis’s argument tha t would seem to also extend the date of filing for purposes of the termination right under § 15.1. Put simply, like the Superior Court, we are unable to come up with a reasonable reading of the contract which, when matched by the facts of record about

wh at happened, would produce the result Davis presses, which is that the literal date of filing that tracks the contractual language precisely was indefinitely extended for one purpose but not for another, and that Radio One silently gave up its important ri ght to terminate if, in its sole discretion, the Engineering Exhibits did not meet its approval.4

FMAs and the Engineering Exhibits were filed a nd no party had exercised its

termination right under § 1 5.1

. 6

NOW, THEREFORE , IT IS ORDERED that the Superior Court ’s June 10,

2015 judgment is AFFIRMED. 7

BY THE COURT:

/s/ Leo E. Strine, Jr.

Chief Justice

6 Because w e affirm on the basis that the Radio One entities’ duties under the Agreement did not

arise until the FMAs and Engineering Exhibits were file d and t he contract ha d not been terminated under § 15.1 , we need not and do not address the parties’ interpretative duel over the

extent to which commercial ly reasonable efforts under § 8.4(a) would include a duty to make certain monetary commitments.

7 See Charl otte Broad., LLC v. Davis Broad. of Atlanta, L.L.C. , 2015 WL 3863245 (Del. Super. June 10, 2015).