Cox Communications

Cox Communications, Inc.

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	$9.1 billion (2010)
Net income	Not currently available
Employees	22,350 (2004)
Parent	Cox Enterprises
Website	www.cox.com

Cox Communications (also known as Cox Cable and formerly Cox Broadcasting Corporation, Dimension Cable Services and Times-Mirror Cable) 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,^[2] and almost 3.2 million digital telephone subscribers, making it the seventh-largest telephone carrier in the country.^[3] Cox is headquartered at 1400 Lake Hearn Drive in Sandy Springs, Georgia, U.S., in the Atlanta metropolitan area.^[4]

History

Original version of current corporate logo, used from 1996 through 2007

Cox Enterprises expanded into the cable television industry in 1962 by purchasing a number of cable systems in Lewistown, Lock Haven and Tyrone (all in 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 1993, Cox began offering telecommunications services to businesses (the first multiple system cable operator to do so). This eventually grew into Cox Business, which now represents $1 billion in annual revenue. In 1995, Cox acquired Times Mirror's cable properties and went public again.^[5] In 1997, Cox became the first multiple system cable operator to offer phone services to customers following the 1996 Telecom Act.

• In 1999, Cox acquired the cable television assets of Media General in Fairfax County and Fredericksburg, Virginia.
• In 2000, Cox Communications acquired Multimedia Cablevision with assets in Kansas, Oklahoma and North Carolina.
• In 2004, the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors found Cox Communications guilty of violating an agreement with the county which stated that all homes served by Cox within Fairfax County would be digital ready with the new fiber optic network by June 2003. When this term expired with less than 30% of the county having been completed, the Board of Supervisors elected to fine Cox $100 per day from the originally agreed completion date, until such time as the work was completed, which was in January 2006. The Board also forbade Cox from raising rates to recover the cost of the fine for a period of 10 years from the actual completion date. The total fine was approximately $93,000.^[6]
• On November 1, 2005, Cox announced the sale of all of its Texas, Missouri, Mississippi and North Carolina properties, as well as some systems in Arkansas, California, Louisiana and Oklahoma to Cebridge Communications. The sale closed in 2006 and those systems were transitioned by their new owner from Cox branding to Suddenlink Communications.
• On May 14, 2007, Cox announced that they had sold their investment in Discovery Communications for the Travel Channel, related assets, and $1.3 billion.^[7]
• On 2007, Diversity Inc. magazine named Cox Communications #25 in its Top 50 Companies for Diversity. Cox climbed to the sixth position on Diversity Inc's 2008 list.^[8] Also in 2008, Cox was named #8 on the Top 10 Companies for African Americans.^[9]
• On November 19, 2010, Cox began offering 'Unbelievably Fair' Wireless services in Orange County, California; Omaha, Nebraska; and, in Hampton Roads, Virginia.
• In February 2011, Cox Communications completed its Alternative Energy Project^[10] which included two fuel cell installations at each of the company’s San Diego, CA and Rancho Santa Margarita, CA headquarters.^[11] Two separate PureCell System 400 kilowatt installations will generate enough onsite power to reduce the company’s dependence of the local power grid and decrease its carbon footprint.^[12]
• In September 2011, Cox Home Security was added to their suite of products listed on their website.^[13] This new service utilizes advanced technologies similar to the home security products offered by other MSOs such as Comcast.^{[citation needed]}
• In August, 2013, Cox launched their Contour TV product and completed rollout early September, 2013. The product integrates HD DVR, TV, iPad, and extra room set-top boxes that utilize user profiles to suggest viewing recommendations. ^[14]

Other business units

Cox Communications' "Digeez" mascot, also more commonly known as a "Digital friend."

• Cox Business: Provides business level video, voice and Internet services.
• Cox Media: Advertising sales
• Travel Media, Inc.: Travel Channel and TravelChannel.com (35%; joint venture with Scripps Networks).^[15]

Privatization

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.^[16] This was the second time Cox Communications was taken private by Cox Enterprises.

Residential services

Cox Cable TV

Cox distributes standard definition and high-definition cable television programming, including Digital Cable.^[17] Cox has no plans to discontinue an analog level of service as part of the digital transition.^[18] 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.^[19]

Digital video recorder

Cox offers digital video recorder service, provided using Motorola,^[20] Scientific-Atlanta, Cisco, or Moxi^{[citation needed]} equipment depending on the local market.

On Demand

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 television. Cox offers replays of ABC and NBC programming in some markets while Comcast offerings include BBC America and CBS.^[21]

Cox High Speed Internet

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 150 Mbit/s. Cox initially launched high-speed Internet in 1996 in its Orange County infrastructure.^[22] Cox licensed the PowerBoost technology from Comcast in 2007 and offers it on the Preferred and Premier level of service.^[23] Top service download speeds are between 50 and 150 Mbit/s. "Soft" monthly bandwidth caps are listed for all four levels of service, (400 GB/month download being the largest), yet Cox currently does not penalize or charge customers for going beyond these limits.^[24] 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 3Mbit/s) to its customers.^[25] Cox High Speed Internet won the PC Magazine Readers' Choice Award for High Speed Internet in 2003, 2004, 2005, 2007, and 2011.^[26]

Cox will withhold access to the Internet by alleged pirates. It is possible for users who have not committed illegal activity to be disconnected from the Internet because of an unverified claim or insecure network, and Cox does not personally investigate the accuracy of these claims before shutting down service.^[27][28] Cox also blocks incoming traffic on port 80 for residential customers,^[29] making it difficult for them to run web servers.

In September 2011, Cox announced the availability of a data usage meter for customers to check their data usage. As of October 2012, Cox does not charge customers who exceed their usage amount for each month. It is unknown if this policy will change in the future.^[30]

Cox Digital Telephone

Cox offers telephone service in the majority of its services areas. Various technologies, including circuit switched and hybrid VoIP systems, are used depending on service areas.^[31] Cox has won multiple J.D. Power and Associates awards for its telephone service.^[32]

Cox Business

Cox Business^[33] provides voice, data and video services for more than 260,000 small and regional businesses, including health care providers, K-12 and higher education, financial institutions and federal, state and local government organizations. According to Vertical Systems Group,^[34] 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 and mid-size business data service providers in J.D. Power and Associates telecommunications studies in 2006, 2008 and 2010.^{[citation needed]} In 2013, Cox Business had the third largest business-facing enterprise by revenue (of cable providers who provide business services), with $1.2 billion in revenue as of the third quarter of 2013.^[35]

Cox Business is an early adopter 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.^[36] 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.

Defunct Cox Wireless

Cox once offered mobile phone and wireless services in four United States markets including Orange County, California, Hampton Roads Virginia, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, and Omaha, Nebraska. Cox marketed their wireless service as 'Unbelievably Fair' Wireless due to a wireless plan which returns money for unused minutes called "Moneyback Minutes."^[37] This allowed customers to receive up to $20 per month added back to their bill in the event that customers had leftover minutes. Cox offered a full range of devices manufactured by Motorola, Samsung, HTC, Kyocera, and LG.

Cox utilized Sprint's voice and 3G networks and also had plans to build their own 4G LTE network.^[37]

On May 24, 2011, Cox Communications announced it would decommission its plans to build a 3G wireless network, and would instead offer Sprint service to half of its current footprint and operate as a Sprint MVNO by then end of 2011.

On November 15, 2011, Cox Communications announced it would halt sales of all its wireless branded products and existing Cox branded wireless operations would be decommissioned by March 30, 2012. Cox eventually also retracted its plans to continue to resell Sprint services as an MVNO.^[38]

Carriage controversies

2000 disputes with Fox

On January 1, 2000, Cox was involved in 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 Tribune Broadcasting), 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 the Cleveland metropolitan area continues to be served by Cox). The removal of those 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.^[39]

LIN TV-Cox dispute

In a separate dispute (clumped with the above dispute by media outlets as the "Cox vs Fox" 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 a 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 a ten-hour arbitration session.^[40] Cox did not offer rebates to its 335,000 subscribers in Fairfax County, Virginia, and Cleveland, Ohio, who also lost their Fox stations.

Marketing

One of Cox's marketing trademarks is a fictional animated "spokesman" character named "Digital Max", used from 2005 through 2008.^{[citation needed]} 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.^{[citation needed]}

References

External links

• Official website
• Cox HSI & CATV support forum VIA dslreports.com (registration required)