Light Reading Mobile – Telecom News, Analysis, Events, and Research

LR Cable News Analysis  

EchoStar Bucks Up for Satellite Broadband

February 14, 2011 |

Some big wheelin' and dealin' by Charlie Ergen and EchoStar Corp. LLC lead off the week in today's cable news roundup.

  • Ergen opened his piggy bank again, this time having his EchoStar set-top and technology unit (the one that owns Sling Media Inc.) pour out about $1.32 billion for Hughes Communications. The buy, which follows Dish Network Corp.'s recent $1 billion play for DBSD and a grab for coveted wireless spectrum and satellite capacity, gives EchoStar satellite broadband technology that complements its video distribution platform. (See Dish's Big Spectrum Buy Meets Static, Charlie Ergen's Spectrum Grab and Rumor: AT&T Batting Eyes at Dish (Again)?)

  • After watching Cox Communications Inc. pick up telephone customers in Las Vegas, local telco CenturyLink Inc. is returning the favor with its new "Prism" digital video service. (See Wireless Not in the Cards for CenturyLink, Qwest .)

  • Streaming Netflix Inc. content on Wii gaming consoles is going disc-less on Wednesday (Feb. 16). In fact, the streaming disc will no longer work starting then, upsetting some gamers who must now find room for the app on Wii storage vaults that are already busting at the seams. (See Netflix Goes Wii.)

  • A new budget proposal from the White House includes a $5 billion investment in the Universal Service Fund. (See Genachowski Tees Up USF Reform.)

  • While pitching Liberty Global Inc.'s new "TV Anywhere" Horizon set-top/multimedia gateway, CEO Mike Fries says he's not losing sleep over Google TV and Apple TV, labeling the Internet video set-tops as "unsatisfactory." (See Celeno Joins Liberty's Video Gateway Lineup , Liberty Global Reveals IP Gateway Partners and Liberty Global Canvassing Europe With Docsis 3.0 .)

  • Rovi Corp. has closed its deal to buy over-the-top video vendor Sonic Solutions. (See Rovi Spends $720M on Sonic Solutions.)

  • Suddenlink Communications expanded the rollout of the newly integrated TiVo Inc. Premiere, marketing the broadband-connected HD-DVR in Amarillo, Canyon, and Tulia, Texas. (See TiVo: $99 Premiere DVR Revving Retail and Suddenlink Boxes Up TiVo Deal .)

  • Here's the latest breathless feature about how the time for video telephony has finally come.

  • Analysts expect Comcast Corp. to report Wednesday that it again lost some basic video subs and gained high-speed data customers during the fourth quarter. Cablevision Systems Corp. is expected to report that it gained subscribers, largely through its acquisition of Bresnan Communications LLC. (See Cablevision Goes Country With Bresnan Buy.)

  • ESPN expanded ESPN 3D to a 24-hour network, recruiting Larry the Cable Guy to record this shameless Valentines Day plug: "Nothing says, 'Honey, I love you,' like a pair of 3-D glasses from ESPN." (See 3DTV Eye Strain? Take a Break, ESPN Says.)

    — Steve Donohue, Special to Light Reading Cable



  • Currently we allow the following HTML tags in comments:

    Single tags

    These tags can be used alone and don't need an ending tag.

    <br> Defines a single line break

    <hr> Defines a horizontal line

    Matching tags

    These require an ending tag - e.g. <i>italic text</i>

    <a> Defines an anchor

    <b> Defines bold text

    <big> Defines big text

    <blockquote> Defines a long quotation

    <caption> Defines a table caption

    <cite> Defines a citation

    <code> Defines computer code text

    <em> Defines emphasized text

    <fieldset> Defines a border around elements in a form

    <h1> This is heading 1

    <h2> This is heading 2

    <h3> This is heading 3

    <h4> This is heading 4

    <h5> This is heading 5

    <h6> This is heading 6

    <i> Defines italic text

    <p> Defines a paragraph

    <pre> Defines preformatted text

    <q> Defines a short quotation

    <samp> Defines sample computer code text

    <small> Defines small text

    <span> Defines a section in a document

    <s> Defines strikethrough text

    <strike> Defines strikethrough text

    <strong> Defines strong text

    <sub> Defines subscripted text

    <sup> Defines superscripted text

    <u> Defines underlined text

    Network Computing encourages readers to engage in spirited, healthy debate, including taking us to task. However, Network Computing moderates all comments posted to our site, and reserves the right to modify or remove any content that it determines to be derogatory, offensive, inflammatory, vulgar, irrelevant/off-topic, racist or obvious marketing/SPAM. Network Computing further reserves the right to disable the profile of any commenter participating in said activities.

     
    Disqus Tips To upload an avatar photo, first complete your Disqus profile. | View the list of supported HTML tags you can use to style comments. | Please read our commenting policy.
     
    Related Content
    White Papers SPONSORED CONTENT
    Featured
    Spanning Tree
    An Ethernet protocol that checks a network for loops