Welcome to the broadband and cable news roundup, Hump Day edition.
Cablevision Systems Corp. (NYSE: CVC) has received "unsolicited interest" in the former Bresnan Communications cable systems in the Midwestern U.S. that the MSO bought in 2010 for US$1.36 billion, Cablevision President and CEO Jim Dolan said Wednesday on the company's third-quarter earnings call, an acknowledgement that comes about three weeks after The Wall Street Journal reported it. "While it has not been our intention to divest this valuable asset, based on the approaches that we have received, we've decided to explore a potential transaction," Dolan added. Those systems, now referred to as Optimum West, serve about 360,000 subs in pockets of Montana, Colorado, Wyoming and Utah. Charter Communications Inc. , an MSO now led by former Cablevision COO Tom Rutledge, is among the parties rumored to be interested in buying those systems. (See Cablevision Might Sell Country, Stay Rock 'n' Roll and Cablevision Goes Country With Bresnan Buy.)
On the financial end, Cablevision posted a third-quarter loss of $3.8 million (1 cent per share) on revenues of $1.69 billion. Cablevision lost 9,600 video subs in the quarter, about half of what it lost in the year-ago period, but gained 28,000 high-speed Internet customers and 22,000 voice subs.
Dish Network LLC (Nasdaq: DISH) Chairman Charlie Ergen is speculating again … about his own company. On the company's third-quarter call Wednesday, Ergen said a merger between Dish and rival satellite TV company DirecTV Group Inc. (NYSE: DTV) would be a "doable deal under the current circumstances," but said no such discussions were underway, reports Multichannel News. Regulators denied an attempted DirecTV-Dish/EchoStar merger in 2002. Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. Inc. analyst Craig Moffett suggested in a research note that Dish's recent struggles would grease the skids. "Dish's weak results in the core business are in fact a selling point to regulators for a merger with a much stronger DirecTV," Moffett wrote.
Time Warner Cable Inc. (NYSE: TWC) is pitching free Xbox gaming consoles to new triple-play subscribers in a Holiday subscriber acquisition campaign being run in tandem with Best Buy. TW Cable is also throwing in free DVR service for one year (minus the equipment fee) and five premium movie channels (HBO, Cinemax, Starz, Showtime and The Movie Channel). The MSO, which lost 140,000 residential video subs in the third quarter, is running the promo through Jan. 5, 2013. (See TW Cable Misses Q3 Targets .)
The New IP is actually bigger even than business. Like another hugely important tech that Light Reading is digging into right now, the New IP has the potential to change the world by fundamentally advancing what it is possible for people to achieve with communications.
Compass Networks Chairman and CEO Matt Bross and Ray Dolin, CEO of Sonus Networks, demonstrate their Sonus IQ SDN solution using a live video conference connection.
We stopped by Aptilo Networks, a market leader in WiFi service management and offloading, to discuss the new possibilities with next-generation WiFi calling and why WiFi should be a natural part of any operator strategy.
Light Reading CEO Steve Saunders sits down with Telecom Italia's Simone Battiferri at Mobile World Congress to discuss virtualization, agility and the economic advantages of the cloud.
At the ICT Leaders Roundtable, hosted jointly by Light Reading and Huawei at the Hotel Renaissance in Barcelona just prior to Mobile World Congress, Hong Kong Telecom's Michael Yue explains how the transformation in its business has changed its customer relationships.
At the ICT Leaders Roundtable, hosted jointly by Light Reading and Huawei at the Hotel Renaissance in Barcelona just prior to Mobile World Congress, Boingo's Dr. Derek Peterson explains how ICT can help telcos bring the physical and virtual worlds closer together.
At the ICT Leaders Roundtable, hosted jointly by Light Reading and Huawei at the Hotel Renaissance in Barcelona just prior to Mobile World Congress, Telefonica's Dr. Mike Short explains how the Internet of Things demands a new low-cost approach to connectivity from telcos.
At the ICT Leaders Roundtable, hosted jointly by Light Reading and Huawei at the Hotel Renaissance in Barcelona just prior to Mobile World Congress, Heavy Reading's Patrick Donegan explains why telcos can't be too hasty in their efforts to transform themselves.
NFV commercial success rests on successful service orchestration strategies which can span heterogeneous physical, virtual, legacy and next-gen networks. Network data and security integrity are additional key aspects. Nakina provides a suite of orchestratable network integrity applications built on an open, scalable MANO enablement platform.
OceanStor OS is Huawei's brand-new storage operating system. While inheriting the consistent high stability, reliability and performance from the company's previous storage products, OceanStor OS abounds in new converged storage features. Specifically, the new storage operating system achieves "five convergences" to lift storage convergence to a higher level.
4K video is a hot topic in the video industry. It will certainly bring an extreme video experience to end users. At the same time, however, it will also pose a big challenge to operators. Check out this Huawei 4K experts' discussion about how operators can achieve success in 4K video service.
Compass Networks Chairman and CEO Matt Bross and Ray Dolin, CEO of Sonus Networks, demonstrate their Sonus IQ SDN solution using a live video conference connection.
We stopped by Aptilo Networks, a market leader in WiFi service management and offloading, to discuss the new possibilities with next-generation WiFi calling and why WiFi should be a natural part of any operator strategy.
At the ICT Leaders Roundtable, hosted jointly by Light Reading and Huawei at the Hotel Renaissance in Barcelona just prior to Mobile World Congress, Hong Kong Telecom's Michael Yue explains how the transformation in its business has changed its customer relationships.
At the ICT Leaders Roundtable, hosted jointly by Light Reading and Huawei at the Hotel Renaissance in Barcelona just prior to Mobile World Congress, Boingo's Dr. Derek Peterson explains how ICT can help telcos bring the physical and virtual worlds closer together.
At the ICT Leaders Roundtable, hosted jointly by Light Reading and Huawei at the Hotel Renaissance in Barcelona just prior to Mobile World Congress, Telefonica's Dr. Mike Short explains how the Internet of Things demands a new low-cost approach to connectivity from telcos.
At the ICT Leaders Roundtable, hosted jointly by Light Reading and Huawei at the Hotel Renaissance in Barcelona just prior to Mobile World Congress, Heavy Reading's Patrick Donegan explains why telcos can't be too hasty in their efforts to transform themselves.
NFV commercial success rests on successful service orchestration strategies which can span heterogeneous physical, virtual, legacy and next-gen networks. Network data and security integrity are additional key aspects. Nakina provides a suite of orchestratable network integrity applications built on an open, scalable MANO enablement platform.
OceanStor OS is Huawei's brand-new storage operating system. While inheriting the consistent high stability, reliability and performance from the company's previous storage products, OceanStor OS abounds in new converged storage features. Specifically, the new storage operating system achieves "five convergences" to lift storage convergence to a higher level.
4K video is a hot topic in the video industry. It will certainly bring an extreme video experience to end users. At the same time, however, it will also pose a big challenge to operators. Check out this Huawei 4K experts' discussion about how operators can achieve success in 4K video service.
Mobile broadband is changing our lives. It's reshaping the Internet, industry, and society. It allows us to freely connect with one another anytime, anywhere. At this year's Mobile World Congress, Huawei will share its latest insights and newest ideas and technologies that will shape the future of MBB. They will showcase their end-to-end MBB solutions that will ...
Light Reading CEO Steve Saunders talks transformation and virtualization – including Light Reading's independent testing of the vendor's virtualization solutions – with Cisco CEO John Chambers at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.
Check out Light Reading's interview with Jay Samit, the newly appointed CEO of publicly traded SeaChange International Inc. With a resume that includes Sony, EMI, and Universal, Samit brings a reputation as an entrepreneur and a disruptor to his new role at the video solutions company. Hear what he had to say about the opportunities in video, as well as the outlook for cable, telco, OTT and mobile service providers.
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