Matt Daneman

The rebranding of Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks into Charter Communications will begin this fall, as the company over the next year reconciles various packages and pricing, and over the next two-plus years standardizes its business processes, said Charter CEO Tom Rutledge Tuesday. He spoke in the company's Q2 earnings call -- its first since Charter closed in May on its approximately $90 billion takeovers of TWC and BHN (see 1605120040). Charter's cloud-based user interface Spectrum Guide will be available in most of legacy Charter's footprint by year's end, and will begin to be available in major TWC markets by mid-2017 and throughout the BHN and TWC footprints by sometime in 2018 as those markets also go all digital in the same time frame, Rutledge said. Today, roughly 60 percent of TWC's footprint is digital, while BHN is at 50 percent, he said.

Hulu's live-streaming service set to debut next year will be among a number of "virtual MVPDs" that will launch over the coming 12 months, Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes said Wednesday. Several Time Warner Turner channels will be part of that live-streaming service, including TNT, TBS, CNN, Cartoon Network, Adult Swim, truTV, Boomerang and Turner Classic Movies, Time Warner said in a news release Wednesday, noting it bought 10 percent of Hulu. Financial terms weren't released, and other owners remain Comcast, Disney and 21st Century Fox. In a conference call announcing Time Warner's Q2 results, Bewkes said growth in live-streaming multichannel video programming distributors "will be great both for consumers and our … brands.” The company is making a variety of subscription VOD investments, including rolling out HBO Now to the Nordic region and Latin America and planning other rollouts later this year and an upcoming art house SVOD offering from Turner, Bewkes said. The Hulu investment "fits our strategy like a glove" by further increasing Time Warner exposure to the growing over-the-top market, he said. Bewkes said the Hulu deal did not include content license obligations and when it comes to licensing content to other SVODs or traditional MVPDs, "We'll do that on a stand-alone, arm's length basis." For the quarter, Time Warner sales fell 5 percent from the year-ago period to $7 billion, driven mostly by declines in lower videogame, home entertainment and TV licensing revenue due to particularly high sales in the comparable quarter a year ago, the company said in a news release. Time Warner had net income of $952 million, down from $971 million. Its stock closed Wednesday at $77.83, up 2.7 percent.

SiriusXM has deployed several demonstration cars to road test its SXM17 platform, which will incorporate two-way cellular connectivity into the company's traditional satellite radio and let it offer nonlinear content, CEO Jim Meyer said Tuesday during the company's Q2 2016 earnings call. The SXM17 platform it's developing with a number of automakers (see 1604280042) "breaks down the big barrier we live with today as a one-way broadcaster" and will let it offer customized playlists and on-demand content, Meyer said. He wouldn't discuss a time frame for SXM17 deployment, saying the company will announce details about timing over the next year.

Numerous groups with an interest in 5G are applauding the FCC for opening up high-frequency bands for 5G in its spectrum frontiers proceeding. Intel said Thursday's 5-0 vote (see 1607140052) is "ensuring that the U.S. remains a world leader in mobile broadband." It said 5G access to the 28 and 37/39 GHz bands and unlicensed use in the 64-71 GHz bands "in an investment-friendly manner will spur development ... in the U.S. and other countries." CEO Brian Krzanich in a statement said, "Consumers and businesses are going to start benefiting from 5G much faster than generally expected and the FCC’s bi-partisan decision ... is crucial to accelerating this phenomenon." Commissioners' "proactive leadership [is] helping pave the way to make 5G networks a reality in the United States," said National Association of Tower Erectors Executive Director Todd Schlekeway. NATE said member companies "have developed and maintained every generation of communications networks and will be on the front lines again in order to help make 5G networks a reality in the future." The Telecommunications Industry Association in a statement said the FCC vote "frees a significant amount of new spectrum for mobile use, and does so without attaching strings or taking a wait-and-see approach. ... Spectrum Frontiers provides both the fuel that will be demanded by next-generation networks, and the predictability that is needed by technology companies." TIA said implementation of the 5G rules must be done "in ways that deliver on the FCC’s promise of a flexible approach, and we must continue to find new and creative ways to address our insatiable demand for more bandwidth." Information Technology Industry Council Vice President-Government Affairs Vince Jesaitis in a blog post Thursday called the spectrum frontiers decision "a historic one, and one that will cement U.S. leadership in 5G connectivity and next generation WiFi technology commonly known as WiGig" by making the U.S. the first country to map out 5G spectrum and identify additional spectrum bands for 5G and other wireless technologies. "This puts the United States well ahead of foreign counterparts by allowing American entrepreneurs and consumers to be the first in the world to have the tools needed to innovate in the new era of the of the internet: the Internet of Things," Jesaitis wrote. "Cars, buildings, infrastructure like highways and bridges, industrial systems, streetlights, and countless other objects will be using wireless connections to transfer data as well. To accommodate the 30 billion devices that will be connected to the internet by 2020, and fully realize the $11.1 trillion boost to the economy that the IoT will bring, we need to build on current wireless technologies by adopting policies like the 5G initiative that will spur investment in next generation wireless technologies." Friday, the White House and agencies unveiled a wireless research effort that includes 5G (see 1607150035).

The FCC under Chairman Tom Wheeler has been remarkably quick and responsive on making spectrum available for 5G, a differentiator that will make the U.S. the global leader in deployment, 5G advocates said Thursday during Information Technology and Innovation Foundation panel. "The U.S. is going to lead because of the FCC," said Peter Pitsch, Intel executive director-communications policy. He said South Korea, Japan and China are considering 5G trials because they and other nations are "looking at the fact the commission is moving so quickly on allocation and assignment." Qualcomm Senior Vice President-Government Affairs Dean Brenner, pointing to recent speeches by Wheeler (see 1606200044) and Commissioner Mike O'Rielly (see 1606270082), said the agency's consensus on 5G is notable "in an era when everything is partisan."

Opposition to TVEyes' appeal and cross appeal of a U.S. District Court decision in a lawsuit by Fox News Network has such bedfellows as NAB, NCTA and a variety of copyright, cable, content and broadcast interests. Multiple amici curiae briefs were filed Wednesday with the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on the Manhattan lower court's decision that the company's archiving function is fair use, but emailing, downloading and date/time searches aren't, and a subsequent injunction (see 1603180007). TVEyes is scheduled to file a response and reply brief by Aug. 15.

Comcast's trial of a 1 terabyte monthly data allowance (see 1604270058) could mean more companies offering similar large data caps, industry experts tell us. Some public interest groups, meanwhile, said the Comcast plan is evidence that data caps themselves are somewhat indefensible. "Comcast's sudden shift to a larger cap now indicates just how easily it could shift back down in the future, perhaps under a more favorable regulatory environment," emailed Sarah Morris, director-open Internet policy at New America's Open Technology Institute.

The cable industry is leveling both barrels at FCC-proposed set-top box rules. The American Cable Association and NCTA said they likely would pursue legal redress in response to agency implementation. "I've seen very few things I'm this confident contravene the express wishes of Congress," NCTA CEO Michael Powell said Thursday in a call with media.

While Stream TV -- Dish Network's foray into over-the-top video service -- was first in the pay-TV universe to look at market segmentation as a business model, Dish's interests longer term lie in being "a connectivity company ... through satellite or wireless," CEO Charlie Ergen said Wednesday during the company's Q1 earnings call. Executives were largely mum about the company's spectrum strategy, citing the quiet period of the upcoming incentive auction, including whether it plans to take part in the auction. But, Ergen said, "We think we're positioned to participate in all kinds of connectivity -- cars are just one of them." He said the company sees connectivity revenue opportunities in IoT.

Comcast's announced plans to expand its TV Everywhere offerings had numerous critics of the FCC set-top box proposal pointing to those plans Wednesday as proof the agency is headed in the wrong regulatory direction. The FCC is "rushing forward with a regulatory proceeding that will upset a marketplace that is undergoing such a dramatic transformation and achieving the goals that it seeks [and] should study these developments and reconsider the path it appears to be on," NCTA said in a statement.