Charter's Facebook page regarding why Charter and the Pac-12 have yet to come to a deal. According to Emily Klipfel, a Charter Representative:
"Charter is interested in providing the PAC-12 Network to our customers, but only if the cost of the service to Charter and subsequently our customers is consistent with agreements the PAC-12 Network has with other video providers of similar size as Charter. We are hopeful that our negotiations with the PAC-12 Network will result in more reasonable terms and provide Charter customers with value".Cable networks that haven't been deterred by cost and have deals with the Pac 12 Networks:ComcastTime, WarnerTWC and Bright House, Cox,Wave Broadband,Western Broadband,Orbitel Comm,Bend Broadband, Frontier, Ashland Fiber Network, and The National Cable Television Cooperative.
According to the St Louis Post-Dispatch:The top officers of Charter Communications are moving to a new office in New York, the company said today:
CEO Tom Rutledge, chief operating officer John Bickham and chief marketing officer Jon Hargis will work from an office to be located somewhere in the New York metro area, said spokeswoman Anita Lamont.
All three were hired recently from New York-based Cablevision.http://www.stltoday.com/business/local/charter-chiefs-move-to-new-york/article_8ff3cbdc-af55-11e1-8efd-0019bb30f31a.html
Charter has most of their operations in the St Louis area and was founded in St. Louis. However Charter recently hired CEO Tom Rutledge who apparently didn't want to move there and so he moved the company to him. I wonder if that provided " Charter customers with value."?
If they have money to move executives to New York and open a new headquarters they have money to carry the Pac 12 Networks! Get the value to their customers..... get it done Charter!
I was doing a search for this very subject and came across your blog. Man, I hope they can get a deal worked out. We're sort of locked into Charter right now with this whole bundle thing.
ReplyDeleteI'm with you on this one Rick. I live in a Los Angeles suburb that is serviced by Charter and is a Pac-12 home area for both USC and UCLA. You would think this would be a no-brainer for Charter since local college and professional sports is the main reason people have them as their cable provider. But, because the Pac-12 is asking 80 cents per Charter subscriber, Charter believes the cost is unwarranted and is currently try to negotiate a carriage fee they believe will be of value to their customers and themselves. I'm not worried at this point of not having the Pac-12 Networks on Charter as of yet, since current programming consists of classic football game replays and a few live sports events such as women's soccer. However, when the football season begins in a few weeks, most early season Pac-12 games will be broadcast on ESPN, ESPN 2, your local FOX over the air affiliate or the FX cable network. A few will be on the Pac-12 Networks, but again not big matchups. The big marquee games begin on Saturday, September 22nd and this is where Charter, DirecTV, Dish, Verizon FiOS and AT&T U-Verse should have announced carriage agreements with the Pac-12 or face huge revolts from customers that could cause them lower subscription bases and financial loses. Something they cannot afford to have happen.
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