Charter, Comcast Ink Spinoff Deal to Expedite Time Warner Cable Purchase
Tuesday, April 29th, 2014
Comcast Corp. on Monday agreed to a three-way deal with Charter Communications Inc. as part of Comcast’s efforts to win regulatory approvals for its proposed $45-billion (U.S.) purchase of Time Warner Cable Inc.
The transaction would make Charter, which lost out to Comcast in a bid to acquire Time Warner Cable, the second-largest cable provider in the United States.
The agreement would leave Comcast with less than 30 per cent of the U.S. residential cable or satellite TV market, a factor seen as a key step to pleasing regulators.
Charter would have about 6 per cent of the pay-TV market, with an eventual shot to climb to 9 per cent.
Under the deal, Charter would pay Comcast $7.3-billion for 1.4 million subscribers. Comcast would divest another 2.5 million subscribers into a new publicly traded company that would be two-thirds owned by Comcast shareholders and one-third owned by Charter.
