Comcast Preparing for Competition, Future

[Steve Mehs]

Comcast, which became the nation's largest multichannel operator with its acquisition of AT&T Broadband late last year, is optimistic about the cable industry's future.

That was the message from Comcast Cable President Steve Burke, who addressed attendees at Tuesday's CableLabs media briefing in Boulder, Colo. "We're more enthusiastic about the future than at any point in the past," he said.

Comcast's goal will be to introduce new products for its 21 million-plus customers, possibly one new service or initiative every 12 to 18 months. "In order to compete, we need to consistently innovate," Burke said.

New services like video-on-demand and HDTV will help the company go on the offensive when competing with satellite TV. "For the past several years, cable has been on a defensive position," he said, stressing that strategy will change.

Comcast has rolled out 50,000 HD boxes so far, "and the numbers are growing dramatically," Burke said.

From SkyReport (http://www.skyreport.com/skyreport/dec2002/120902.shtm#three) (Used with Permission)

[EdF]

Comcast in the Philly area (specifically Willow Grove) now offers VOD, which is excellent, and HD on 3 local stations and HBO and Showtime. We have had Dish for almost 4 years but decided to try CC's special offer of Digital cable plus HBO (12 channels) for $34.95 for the first 3 months, increasing to about $72 per month after the first three. When it was being installed 4 weeks ago, I asked the installer about PVR's for cable and he told me they are currently field testing PVR and hope to make it available later this year - no other specifics about it.

CC digital cable is giving Dish a run for their money, in my opinion. Even the analog channels (1-99) are excellent and they are distributed to over 10 tv's in the house. Currently, only the main tv has the digital converter but if we decide to stay with CC and drop Dish in two more months, we'll add one or two additional digital boxes at about $6.50 per.

We'll save with CC also because we currently have 5 Dish receivers costing an extra $20 per month. I've stated many times how much we hate CC but they are changing. The installer even replaced the 10+ year-old drop line from the pole to the house with a new line which is sure to have improved the analog reception.

Decisions, decisions...

[Brett]

Comcast needs few more channels: Trio, DIY, Oxygen, LMN, MuchMusic, Newsworld Hallmark(fulltime), a developed Spanish package then they'd most of everything the sat. companies are selling. But Comcast has upgraded their systems to support several digital channel additions - Its just contract signing they havent done.

Comcast could add all the digital local stations, giving them some advantage over DBS companies.

I wonder if Comcast could strike deals with KYW(CBS), WPVI(ABC), WCAU(NBC), WTXF(FOX) and WPHL(WB), to create simulated west and mountain feeds (would it work?) but of the same affiliates (so you have WPVI-West for example). SInce we'd still see the same local ads, I cant imagine the networks oppose this. Miss your show at 8, watch it at 9 or 11. I wonder if such is possible. We already have something similar, ABC's SoapNet. Miss the ABC daytime soaps on WPVI, watch it on SoapNet the same day.

[juan ellitinez]

Thats what pvr's are for!!!

[Brett]

Yeah, what if you missed the show - and didnt set it for record? What if you didnt realize what you missed was something you may have liked?

Can PVRs fix that? The cost of a PVR is more expensive than a typical converter too. BTW, I am not saying this in replace of a PVR unit, but an addition to the digital cable programming service.

[Bogy]

Cox has rolled out PVR/DVR's in its first market this month. (Gainesville FL) Their strategy is to offer the DVR's at the same cost as a digital box, so at least with Cox, the DVR will not be more expensive. I can't wait until they get to the Omaha market.

[EdF]

Speaking of missed shows, some of them MAY be available with CC's Video-on-Demand, which is basically free (no cost per program) except for films similar to PPV. The VOD is really nice and a lot of the offered programs even have the commercials excised from the original showing, AND, there is some VOD programming for a channel not yet on our CC system (DIY).

All VOD programs have PVR "functions," pause, fast viewed rewind and forward, stop and play, and the VOD films, usually $3.99 offer a 24 hour window for unlimited viewing.

We find ourselves increasing the free VOD viewing at the expense of decreased Dish viewing.

[jrbdmb]

Originally posted by Brett
Comcast needs few more channels: Trio, DIY, Oxygen, LMN, MuchMusic, Newsworld Hallmark(fulltime), a developed Spanish package then they'd most of everything the sat. companies are selling. But Comcast has upgraded their systems to support several digital channel additions - Its just contract signing they havent done. I was pushed over the edge from Comcast to satellite when Comcast started *dropping* channels from their lineup - Fox Sports World (for me), Travel Channel (for my wife).

Comcast could win me back if they'd start to offer what satellite has now:
- access to out-of-market locals (east/west coast feeds)
- access to out-of-market sports channels (I know the pro stuff is blacked out, but there is plenty of college fball/bball to watch, much of which is not in the ESPN packages)
- offer the majority of channels AT150 / TCPLus offer, instead of dropping channels like they started doing right before I left.

[Brett]

I read about Comcast pulling FOX Sports World on some lineups. Comcast has FSW Espanol here only through the Spanish package Canales N. The pulling of the English version had to do with competing with Outdoor Life Network(owned by Comcast), atleast that what I heard.

As for Travel Channel, Comcast has all the Discoverys here except Travel and Comcast has never shown much interest in getting Travel on systems that already dont carry it. The Discovery owners wanted systems to carry Discovery Health and Animal Planet more over Travel Channel. I wanted to know if Scripps Howard will be able to get their DIY Network channel on the MidAtlantic Comcasts. They made DirecTV and Dish Network carry it - it'd only be fair if Comcast was required to carry it also. Its going to be tough for a station owner to get their channel carried on Comcast now. Comcast has clusters in every market, offers high speed internet VOD, etc. The station needs cable carriage more than cable needs the station so wont be able to strike deals easy with Comcast.

It was better when the cable systems were locally owned, and requests for channels were actually taken into consideration. Comcast can prevent a competing network to get carried and over millions of HH.