Cablevision
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| Cablevision Systems Corporation. | |
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| Type | Public (NYSE: CVC) |
| Founded | 1973 |
| Headquarters | Bethpage, New York, USA |
| Key people | Charles Dolan, Chairman James Dolan, President & CEO |
| Industry | Cable television, Professional sports |
| Products | iO Digital Cable Cable Television Services Optimum Online Cable Internet News 12 Madison Square Garden Radio City Music Hall New York Knicks New York Rangers New York Liberty Hartford Wolf Pack |
| Revenue | $4.9 billion USD (2004) |
| Employees | 19,095 (2004) |
| Website | www.cablevision.com |
Cablevision Systems Corporation is an American cable television company. It is the 5th largest cable provider in the USA, with most customers residing in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and parts of Pennsylvania. [1] Cablevision also offers high-speed Internet connections (Optimum Online), as well as digital cable (iO), and VoIP phone service (Optimum Voice) through its Optimum brand name.
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[edit] Sports holdings
The Madison Square Garden, L.P. subsidiary controls the Madison Square Garden arena in New York City, and the professional sports teams that play there—the New York Knicks, New York Rangers, and New York Liberty. The same company also owns the Hartford Wolf Pack, a minor-league professional hockey team affiliated with the Rangers, and operates (but does not own) one Connecticut sports venue Rentschler Field.
Cablevision's sports holdings also include TV rights for the Knicks, Rangers, Liberty, New York Islanders, New Jersey Devils and Red Bull New York. These games are aired on their MSG Network and MSG Plus (formerly FSN New York) cable channels. Cablevision previously had the rights to the New York Yankees, New Jersey Nets and New York Mets, who left to start their own channels. Cablevision previously attempted to purchase the Yankees, Mets and Boston Red Sox, in part, to control their broadcast rights.
[edit] Other Cablevision properties
Other properties that are owned by Cablevision, through its Madison Square Garden, L.P. division, include the Beacon Theater [2] and Clearview Cinemas. They have a long-term lease to operate Radio City Music Hall. Cablevision does own Radio City Entertainment, the company that operates the Rockettes.
The company owns a satellite television company called Voom, which shut down on April 30, 2005, but lives on as a series of High-definition television channels available on Dish Network, iO digital cable as of July 2007 and internationally. The channel boasts of having the most HD channels than any other service; however, DirecTV planned to offer over 100 HD Channels by the end of 2007.[3] The company is based in Bethpage, New York on Long Island and is headed by the Dolan family, who reside on Long Island.
On April 30, 2007, Cablevision announced that its control of FSN Bay Area and FSN New England is being bought by Comcast for $570 million.[1]
On May 12th, 2008, Newsday reported that it would be purchased by Cablevision in a deal worth $650m.[2]
[edit] Cablevision's role in the West Side Stadium debate
In 2004 and 2005, Cablevision provided funding for an advertising campaign against the proposed construction of a stadium on the West Side of Manhattan supported by the Mayor of New York City, Michael Bloomberg. The stadium would have principally served the New York Jets, and was an essential part of New York City's failed bid for the 2012 Olympics. Cablevision had offered a competitive bid that far exceeded the bid of the Jets for property owned by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, where the new stadium would have been located. The plans to build the stadium were abandoned in June 2005 when the New York State Assembly under the leadership of Speaker Sheldon Silver refused to provide state subsidies for the project.
[edit] Products and services
- Optimum Online
- Optimum Voice
- iO Digital Cable
- Optimum TV
- Optimum Lightpath
[edit] Carriage disputes
Cablevision earned notoriety in the New York City area for playing hardball with the YES Network in 2002 and 2003. Cablevision refused to carry the Yankees' official television network, depriving Yankee fans of telecasts of most of their games for the entire 2002 season. Pressure from federal and state officials finally convinced Cablevision to sign a carriage deal just before the 2003 season started.
Cablevision has also never carried the NFL Network, as the company has stated that it would like to be able to carry NFL Sunday Ticket (which is, by contract, exclusive to DirecTV until the 2011 season) before it carries NFL Network. The NFL had offered Cablevision (as well as Time Warner Cable, who has accepted the deal) a free preview of its programming from December 24–30. While it did not include any live NFL games, it did include the December 28th Texas Bowl, including local favorite, the Rutgers Scarlet Knights. Cablevision had publicly agreed to only carry the Texas Bowl, but the NFL rejected that offer, insisting that the entire free preview week be taken. New Jersey legistators were threatening legal action if a deal was not reached. [4] On December 22nd, Cablevision accepted the free preview to be on its digital tier, and the Texas Bowl to be available to all of its subscribers. Cablevision, however, still does not have a long term deal to carry the network. [5] The free preview aired on channel 414. Cablevision, however, did not publicly promote it or even mention it on its listings. The program description on the on-screen guide for channel 414 read "Flyers at Islanders, 1/2".
Cablevision, as a content provider, also engaged in a dispute with Verizon over the carriage of MSG Network and Fox Sports Net New York on its FiOS television systems. Verizon sued Cablevision, claiming that the latter company did not want to make their valuable local sports coverage available to an emerging competitor to their cable systems. An agreement was reached in November 2006 allowing FiOS to carry these channels.[6].
[edit] Corporate governance
Current members of the board of directors of Cablevision are: Charles Dolan, James Dolan, Patrick Dolan, Rand Araskog, Frank Biondi, Charles Ferris, Richard Hochman, Victor Oristano, Thomas Reifenheiser, John R. Ryan, Brian Sweeney, Vincent Tese, Leonard Tow.
In 2006, the Dolan family announced a plan to purchase the company and privatize it, after a failed attempt in 2005, which would have spun off Rainbow Media as a publicly traded company.
On May 2, 2007, after repeated attempts, the Dolan family announced that a deal worth $10.6 billion had been reached for Cablevision to be taken private.[3] The deal still requires the approval of company shareholders other than the Dolan family. Cablevision stock trades under the ticker symbol CVC on the New York Stock Exchange.
[edit] Subsidiaries
- Rainbow Media Holdings LLC owns a series of local and national cable networks including IFC, AMC, Fuse, WE, News 12 , MSG Network and Voom .
- Cablevision once owned New York area electronics chain The Wiz, before closing it.
[edit] Competition on Long Island
For many years, Cablevision has been the sole cable provider for the people of Long Island, though it was unofficial, but recently, the new Verizon FiOS service has been going around Long Island and other places, starting franchise agreements with local villages and towns. This could begin to pose a threat on Cablevision's part, since Cablevision has fewer channels than FiOS, as well as other service providers such as Time Warner Cable, and they have been criticised for their frugality on Long Island. However, Verizon does not have the all Rainbow Media Holdings channels, such as News 12 Networks, MSG HD and MSG Plus HD.
[edit] Recent News
[edit] References
- ^ Comcast, Cablevision in deal on 2 sports networks, Yahoo!, April 30, 2007
- ^ Cablevision announces deal to buy Newsday, Newsday, May 12, 2008
- ^ Cablevision Agrees to Be Taken Private, Yahoo!, May 2, 2007
[edit] External links
- Cablevision website
- Optimum website
- iO (Interactive Optimum) Digital Cable Television Service
- Optimum Online High-speed broadband Cable Internet Service
- Optimum Voice Digital Phone Service
- Interview (March 7, 2005) about possible sale of Cablevision
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