Comcast and Charter announced an agreement on a wireless partnership yesterday morning although it isn’t the first time they’ve done so. In 1994, TCI, Comcast and Cox partnered with Sprint creating the Personal Communication Services (PCS) band (1900 MHz). The service was discontinued four years later due to poor demand. The cable providers united with Sprint again in 2005, launching a wireless service called Pivot. Eventually that created the present MVNO agreement with VZ, which has allowed Comcast and Charter to look at entering wireless again, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Craig Moffett of MoffettNathanson said the announcement would only have been surprising if it hadn’t happened. “Still,” Moffett said, ‘there are surprises in the language of the 8-K. The announcement pours cold water on all of the various M&A scenarios about which people have so incessantly speculated,” he said.
According to Moffett it would have been “crazy” for the two companies not to pursue the wireless business together. “Each has rights to the Verizon MVNO only in their own respective footprints,” he said. “But each will obviously have to give their respective customers the ability to use their wireless devices nationally. The economies that come with offloading traffic onto owned and operated facilities, particularly their respective WiFi footprints, are the critical basis of sharing, but operationalizing that requires integration of technology plans, network design, etc.,” he said.
As part of the agreement, each part will ensure that their respective economics are optimized.
May 9, 2017
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