Altice is buying New Jersey cable ISP Service Electric Cable for $150 million in cash, expanding its footprint there, it said Wednesday. It said the deal is expected to close by Q3.
U.S. District Judge William Sessions in Burlington, Vermont, rejected Netflix's motion to dismiss publisher Chooseco's civil complaints about Choose Your Own Adventure in a Black Mirror episode (see 1901140004), according to a 30-page order (in Pacer) Tuesday. Netflix outside counsel didn't comment. Sessions said Chooseco showed consumers associate its mark with interactive books and that the mark covers other forms of interactive media.
Regional sports network Altitude Sports and Entertainment's amended antitrust complaint (in Pacer, docket 1:19-cv-03253) against Comcast filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Denver fleshes out its arguments the MVPD is likely to monopolize the Denver RSN market by driving Altitude out of business (see 1911180062). That's based on our side-by-side comparison of the original and amended complaint. It said now that exclusionary conduct, in this case, isn't just a refusal to deal but also conduct that forecloses competitors from access to customers. It said Comcast's dominance in the distribution marketplace enhances its power to exclude RSN competition and makes it likely Comcast will succeed in monopolizing that market. Comcast didn't comment Wednesday.
The FCC should look at a C-band clearing process that includes an incentive payment ladder for incumbents, including earth station operators, to relocate as soon as possible and that allows direct payments from auction winners to those incumbents, Cox Communications said in a docket 18-122 posting Tuesday. It urged a reimbursement regime giving earth station operators funds for both relocated C-band operations and fiber deployment, and affirmation that video delivery will be allowed in the upper 200 MHz of the repacked band. It said the FCC could use either the estimated costs framework used in the broadcast incentive auction for reimbursing, or MVPD earth station operators could get reimbursement via a fixed sum for relocating each individual channel field. The FCC may vote Feb. 28 on such rules (see 2002030061).
The $1 billion copyright infringement jury verdict against Cox Communications (see 1912300025) is "wholly divorced from any possible injury to Plaintiffs ... or any conceivable deterrent purpose" and should be "substantially reduced" or Cox should get a new trial on damages, the cable ISP said in a docket 18-cv-00950 motion (in Pacer). It sought Friday a new trial in U.S. District Court in Alexandria, Virginia. Music-label plaintiffs didn't comment Monday.
Charter Communications will offer 5G mobile service this quarter, said CEO Tom Rutledge on a Q4 call Friday. It's "likely to participate" in the upcoming citizens band radio service spectrum auction, he said. Asked whether Charter would ever move to its own wireless network instead of relying at least partly on a mobile virtual network operator, Rutledge said it depends on pricing. He said it has no immediate plans to change its Verizon MVNO relationship, and anticipates it existing "for years to come." Rutledge said 10G investments will be done incrementally over time, and won't require an immediate network overhaul, saying Charter surpassed 10G capabilities in lab testing. Q4 revenue of $11.8 billion rose 4.7 percent year over year. It ended 2019 with 24.9 million residential broadband customers, up 5.4 percent, 15.6 million video customers, down 3 percent, and 9.4 million voice customers, down 6.8 percent. It has 1.08 million mobile lines, compared with 134,000. The stock closed up 5 percent to $517.46.
At year's end, 155,029 CableCARDs were in service, with 20,873 in inventory, NCTA said Wednesday in FCC docket 97-80. It said the average monthly CableCARD lease was $2, and average installation cost $50. The deployments were down slightly from the year-ago quarter.
New Jersey Board of Public Utilities commissioners are preliminarily restrained and enjoined from taking further action to enforce a Nov. 13 cease and desist order against Altice until litigation concludes at U.S. District Court in Newark, said Judge Brian Martinotti in a Wednesday order (in Pacer). “Or until the Court issues an order determining that circumstances render the injunction unnecessary (a) because Altice is no longer subject to effective competition or (b) if Congress repeals or a court invalidates any of the relevant provisions of the Cable Act.” Altice sued BPU for seeking to force the cable company to use pro-rated billing. The company argues that violates the Cable Act, the Constitution’s supremacy clause and New Jersey law.
The FCC should institute a "program carriage statute of limitations" that starts ticking when the program carriage offense allegedly occurs, bringing such rules in line with the time limits the agency puts on related matters like good faith requirements in the retransmission consent context and program access complaints, Commissioner Mike O'Rielly blogged Tuesday. He also urged an automatic stay of an administrative law judge's program carriage complaint initial decision to give the cable operator that loses a chance to appeal the decision to the full commission. O'Rielly recommended axing the requirement cable operators keep records of their attributable interests in video programming services and carriage of those vertically integrated video programming services on their cable systems.
NCTA backs USTelecom recommendations to reduce proposed letter of credit burdens for participants in the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund, posted Friday in docket 19-126. NCTA opposes USTelecom's request the FCC provide continued noncompetitively bid Connect America Fund support to price cap carriers. "As the Commission correctly states in the draft order, the support was always intended to be limited in duration," the telco group said. USTelecom didn't comment beyond its request.