| Type | Subsidiary |
|---|---|
| Industry | Telecommunications |
| Founded | 1962 |
| Headquarters | 1400 Lake Hearn Drive near Atlanta, Georgia 30319 U.S.A. |
| Key people | Patrick J. Esser, President James C. Kennedy, Chairman Anne Cox Chambers, Director |
| Products | Cable television, Broadband internet, VoIP, Wireless |
| Revenue | $9.1B (2010) |
| Net income | Not currently available |
| Employees | 22,350 (2004) |
| Parent | Cox Enterprises |
| Website | http://www.cox.com |
Cox Communications (also known as Cox Cable and formerly Cox Broadcasting Corporation and Dimension Cable Services) is a privately owned subsidiary of Cox Enterprises providing digital cable television, telecommunications and wireless services in the United States. It is the third-largest[1] cable television provider in the United States, serving more than 6.2 million customers, including 2.9 million digital cable subscribers, 3.5 million Internet subscribers, and 2.2 million digital telephone subscribers.[2] Cox is headquartered at 1400 Lake Hearn Drive in Sandy Springs, Georgia, U.S., north of Atlanta.[3]
One of its prominent marketing trademarks is a fictional animated "spokesman" character named Digital Max, used from 2005 through 2008. The phasing out of Digital Max in 2008 was followed by the introduction of the current Cox mascots, the "Digeez," little digital helpmates featured in many of Cox Communications brand commercials. The new little helpers, dressed in all white with blue goggles and hands, closely resemble the main character from the 1982 arcade game, "Dig Dug".
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Cox Enterprises expanded into the cable television industry in 1962 by purchasing a number of cable systems in Lewistown, Lock Haven and Tyrone, Pennsylvania, followed by systems in California, Oregon and Washington. The subsidiary company, Cox Broadcasting Corporation (later renamed to Cox Communications), was not officially formed until 1964, when it was established as a public company traded on the New York Stock Exchange. It was taken private by Cox Enterprises in 1985.
In 2004, Cox Enterprises announced its intention to purchase those shares of Cox Communications which it did not already own. A $6.6 Billion tender offer was completed in December of that year, and Cox Communications has been a wholly owned subsidiary ever since.[9] This was the second time Cox was taken private by Cox Enterprises.
Cox distributes standard definition and high definition cable television programming, including Digital Cable.[10] Cox has no plans to discontinue an analog level of service as part of the digital transition.[11] Cox launched Digital Cable on its Orange County system in 1997. In February, 2008 Cox started to implement Switched Digital Video (SDV) technology in some of their markets.[12]
Cox offers digital video recorder service, provided using Motorola,[13] Scientific-Atlanta or Moxi equipment depending on the local market.
Cox offers video on demand service in the majority of its markets under the name On Demand. On Demand offerings are fairly standardized, portal based, carry VODnets like The Ski Channel, and in some markets include High Definition. Cox offers replays of ABC and NBC programming in some markets while Comcast includes offerings BBC America and CBS.[14]
Cox offers four levels of High Speed Internet in all of its markets, Starter, Essential, Preferred and Premier. Some Cox markets also offer an Ultimate speed tier with download speeds up to 50 Mbit/s. Cox initially launched High Speed Internet in 1996 in its Orange County system.[15] Cox licensed the PowerBoost technology in 2007 and offers it on the Preferred and Premier level of service.[16] Top service download speeds are between 25 and 50 Mbit/s. Monthly bandwidth caps are in place for all four levels of service, with 400 gb/month download being the largest.[17] In 2011, the FCC released the "Measuring Broadband America" report where it was revealed that many broadband providers provided lower than advertised internet speeds to their consumers. Analysis of the report data showed that Cox Cable only delivered 83.4% of its advertised internet speed (on speeds above 3mbps) to its customers.[18] Cox High Speed Internet won the PC Magazine Readers' Choice Award for High Speed Internet in 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2007.[19]
In September 2011, Cox announced the availability of a data usage meter for customers to check their data usage. As of 2011[update], Cox does not charge customers who exceed their usage amount for each month. It is unknown if this policy will change in the future.[20]
Cox offers telephone service in the majority of its services areas. Various technologies, including circuit switched and VoIP systems are used depending on service areas.[21] Cox has won multiple J.D. Power and Associates awards for its telephone service.[22]
Cox Business provides voice, data and video services for more than 260,000 small and regional businesses, including healthcare providers, K-12 and higher education, financial institutions and federal, state and local government organizations. According to Vertical Systems Group, Cox Business is the fourth largest provider of business Ethernet services in the U.S. based on customer ports and the company ranked highest among small/midsize business data service providers in J.D. Power and Associates telecommunications studies in 2006, 2008 and 2010.
Cox Business has a long-standing commitment to voice innovation. It was one of the early adopters of Voice over IP technology and, in 2007, Cox became the first cable provider in North America to deploy a fully owned and managed IP telephony service for businesses, Cox Business VoiceManager. Cox Business is expected to launch Managed IP PBX, SIP Trunking and IP Centrex services in 2011, allowing customers to more efficiently route voice traffic over Internet Protocol. Cox Business currently supports more than 800,000 business phone lines.
Cox currently offers mobile phone and wireless services in three US markets including Orange County, Calif., Hampton Roads Virg., and Omaha NE. Cox markets their wireless service as 'Unbelievably Fair' Wireless due to a wireless plan which returns money for unused minutes called "Moneyback Minutes." [23] This allows customers to receive up to $20 per month added back to their bill in the event that customers have left over minutes. Cox offers a full range of devices manufactured by Motorola, Samsung, HTC, Kyocera, and LG.
Cox currently utilizes Sprint's voice and 3G networks but has plans to build their own as well as a 4G LTE network. [23]
Cox Wireless Decommission On May 24,2011 Cox Communications announced it will decommission it's plans to build a 3G wireless network. It will instead offer Sprint service to half of its current footprint and will operate as a Sprint MVNO by then end of 2011. It is important to note that no Cox Wireless customers had ever utilized this network.
On January 1, 2000 Cox was involved into a retransmission consent dispute with News Corporation (the parent company of the Fox broadcast network), pulling four Fox owned-and-operated stations, after retransmission consent talks between News Corp. and Cox broke down, reportedly because Fox had denied permission for Cox to broadcast programming on its O&O stations unless Cox gave it two channel slots on its digital cable service. The affected stations were WJW-TV in Cleveland, Ohio (now owned by Local TV), KTBC in Austin, Texas, KRIV in Houston, Texas and KDFW in Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas, off its cable systems in those areas; another Fox O&O WHBQ-TV in Memphis, was also pulled from its Jonesboro, Arkansas system (of the mentioned systems, only Cleveland metropolitan area continues to be serviced by Cox). The removal of these stations, which were temporarily replaced with premium service Starz! Family (which was made available to subscribers for free), blacked out Fox programming to 425,000 Cox customers. The blackout lasted six days as the two sides came to an agreement on January 6, and the Fox-owned stations were brought back to the systems. Cox gave $1 refunds of their January cable bill to roughly 90,000 subscribers in Texas and Arkansas as compensation.[25]
In a separate dispute that occurred around the same time, customers in Hampton Roads, Virginia lost access to LIN TV-owned Fox affiliate WVBT (channel 43) on January 1, 2000; retransmission talks between WVBT and Cox broke down, reportedly due to a demand by WVBT to be placed somewhere between channels 2 and 14 (it had been broadcast on channel 43). Cox refused to move WVBT to lower channel number; the channel space was filled in the interim by pay channel HBO Family. It was not until February 5 of that year that the station resumed on Cox's Hampton Roads system (remaining on channel 43), after an agreement was reached during an ten-hour arbitration session.[26] Cox did not offer rebates to its 335,000 subscribers in Fairfax County, Virginia, and Cleveland, Ohio who also lost their Fox stations.
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