Sunday, March 20, 2016

It’s [almost] a done deal

Charter is about get FCC approval on its plan to buy TWC and Bright House Networks for $60B+.  Likely conditions attached to the deal are assurances to comply with net neutrality rules, even if thrown out by the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, expand high-speed broadband into communities with no alternative to the low-speed offerings of the incumbent telecom company, and limit/restrict Charter from including how content owners can distribute their programming.

With little network overlap among cable firms, the DOJ’s antitrust concerns will not be on the elimination of local TV market competition, but on the combined firm’s heft in programming negotiations (same concern with the Comcast-TWC deal, but on a smaller scale).


If the merger is approved, Charter will be the second largest MVPD/ISP in the country.

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