Cox Communications is offering gigabit-speed Internet service in parts of Omaha, Las Vegas and Orange County, California, after launching in the Phoenix area last fall, it said in a news release Tuesday. Cox looks to launch its G1gablast service in parts of Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Rhode Island and Virginia this summer, while aiming to offer it in all of its markets by the end of 2016. Cox said it continues to upgrade its current most-popular Internet packages: Cox High Speed Internet Preferred and Cox High Speed Internet Premier, doubling their speeds in 2014 for almost 75 percent of its customers.
Charter Communications and CSG extended their contract five years, through 2019, the provider of billing and customer-support services to cable and other operators said in a news release Tuesday. The deal "provides the framework for Charter to consolidate additional customers that it may gain through acquisition activities onto CSG’s billing solution," it said. Charter is expected to consider again trying to buy Time Warner Cable now that Comcast abandoned its deal for TWC in the face of regulatory scrutiny (see 1504240066).
Viacom agreed to use Rentrak’s Advanced Demographics measurement service to measure its TV ratings and VOD usage, the vendor said Friday. The company said it draws its measurement information from more than 31 million TVs in 210 local markets. Viacom will be able to use Rentrak’s technology to “precisely target consumer audiences” and to support its “advanced data approach, including the recently announced Viacom Vantage, a data-driven advertising product that gives advertisers the flexibility to define and reach custom audiences,” Rentrak said. It "strengthens our insights arsenal and our ability to unlock new levels of targeting,” said Viacom Executive Vice President-Strategic Insights and Research Colleen Fahey Rush in a Rentrak news release.
Four of the five largest cable providers deployed more than 532,000 CableCARDs through March 31 for use in CableCARD-enabled retail devices, NCTA told the FCC in a filing posted Friday in docket 97-80. It didn’t include data from Charter Communications “because of issues related to a transition of Charter’s IT system,” NCTA said. Charter’s data will be submitted “as soon as possible,” NCTA said. Comcast, with 346,419, had the largest number of CableCARDs “installed in active customer homes,” NCTA said.
Arris and Charter Communications completed their $135 million acquisition of ActiveVideo, the companies said in a Friday news release. Arris now owns 65 percent of the joint venture company that Arris and Charter formed to set up the acquisition, they said. ActiveVideo is the developer of CloudTV, a cloud-based software platform enabling service providers, content creators and CE makers “to rapidly deploy new services by virtualizing consumer premises equipment functions in the cloud,” the companies said.
A hearing on whether Cablevision discriminated against the Game Show Network was delayed by a month, now to start July 7 at 10 a.m., said the FCC administrative law judge overseeing the case. GSN has said the cable operator discriminated against it by not carrying the channel as widely as its own affiliated programming, which the plaintiff contends is similar (see 1110140062). The program carriage complaint case earlier was scheduled to start June 1. After the first day, successive days of hearings will start at 9:30 a.m., said the new order by Chief FCC ALJ Richard Sippel posted Thursday in docket 12-122. Also last week, Cablevision asked Sippel to dismiss the case (see 1504300051).
A cable operator sought rate deregulation in three Pennsylvania communities with a total of about 20,000 households as of the 2013 census. Atlantic Broadband's petition to the Media Bureau for determination of effective competition, posted Thursday in FCC docket 12-1, cited rival pay-TV services being offered in Altoona, Martinsburg and Roaring Spring by DirecTV and Dish Network. Earlier this week, NATOA and public, educational and government channel advocates said they're concerned about FCC plans to possibly change the effective competition process (see 1504290067).
The INSP network will be available to Cox Communications customers May 20 in San Diego and Santa Barbara, said the programmer in a news release Thursday. INSP is a family-oriented channel that received an award from The Parents Television Council, it said.
The Game Show Network can’t show that Cablevision’s decision to place the network on a sports and entertainment tier had an adverse effect on its subscribership, advertising revenue or ability to compete, said the operator in a partially redacted motion for summary judgment posted in the companies’ administrative law carriage case Thursday. “In opposition, GSN will undoubtedly assert that it would have done even better if it had not been retiered by Cablevision.” Even "if true, that is irrelevant for the purposes of this motion,” Cablevision said. If the case goes to trial, the network won’t be able to prove that Cablevision’s tiering decision involved “discriminatory intent,” Cablevision said. The administrative law judge should enter a summary decision dismissing GSN’s carriage complaint “rather than using the Commission’s limited resources to conduct a trial” that GSN can’t win, Cablevision said in docket 12-122. The programmer didn’t comment.
A cable equipment maker and a Web content caching provider are working together on IP video delivery. Arris said Wednesday it will integrate Akamai's Aura Licensed Content Delivery Network and Aura Object Store into its IP video products such as network DVRs and media servers. It gives "operators a variety of choices for streamlining, managing, and scaling digital content delivery," they said in a news release. "It will also support operators as they adopt multiscreen and mobile delivery platforms." Cable operators and others are increasing the amount of video they deliver in IP (see report in the Dec. 24, 2013, issue).