Cox Communications formed a special committee and hired 3 advisers to consider Cox Enterprises’ bid for the 38% of Cox that it doesn’t own, company executives said. The leveraged buyout offer is $32 per share, or $7.9 billion total. The committee comprises independent directors on Cox’s board including Andrew Young, former Atlanta mayor and U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Cox Enterprises announced it was proposing to take the company private by buying out the publicly held minority interest (CD Aug 3 p4). FCC reporting requirements will change little for Cox.
The number and value of TV stations sold the first half of the year slightly increased compared with last year, according to BIA Financial Network. In the first half, 39 full power stations were sold for $323 million combined. Although the figures compare favorably to the 22 sold for $242 million in 2003’s first half, TV transactions remain at a historically low level, BIA executives said. “Until the ownership rules are finally resolved, television station sales activity will continue to be weak,” said Mark Fratrik, BIA’s vp. Unaffected by any pending ownership rule change were LPTV stations, which continued to show growth. The first 6 months, 75 stations sold for $11 million total, compared with the 38 sold for $4 million a year earlier. Fratrik said growing demand for niche programmers in local markets with no full-power alternative contributed to the increase. The number of radio transactions also increased, though the asset value declined, Fratrik told us. Separately, BIA said the number of Spanish-language radio stations have increased 86% in the last 5 years. Between 1998 and 2003 the number of Spanish radio stations increased from 302 to 561. Of that number, 438 were in Arbitron-rated markets and 191 were in the 20 largest Hispanic radio markets.
Content is king, at least when it comes to political donations. The content industry -- broadcasting, cable, satellite, movies and music -- is the leading communications sector in campaign donations in the 2004 election cycle, according to Federal Election Commission records. The computer and Internet sector is closing fast, however, trailed by the separate sectors of telecom utilities and manufacturers. Together these 4 sectors comprise most of the $53.4 million the communications industry has given this election cycle through July 5, according to data compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics.
Correction: T-Mobile USA didn’t receive money from the federal USF fund 2nd quarter (CD Aug 13 p9). The carrier collected $38 million from its customers to satisfy its USF contribution obligations. T-Mobile USA doesn’t have ETC status and can’t receive funds through the USF program.
Alcatel has the largest segment of the U.S. digital loop carrier market, with 42%, followed by Advanced Fibre Communications (AFC) with 38%. Ciena and Adtran tied for 3rd with 5%, according to a Communications Industry Researchers (CIR) report. CIR said the leading companies dominate the market’s 3 segments: (1) Alcatel rules the Bell company market. (2) AFC is the main seller to non-Bell ILECs with more than 500,000 lines, such as Sprint, Alltel and CenturyTel. (3) The 3rd place companies dominate the mainly rural small ILEC market -- www.cir-inc.com.
T-Mobile USA said it added 1.092 million customers 2nd quarter, topping analyst expectations and increasing customer additions the past year to 4 million. The subsidiary of Germany’s Deutsche Telekom now has a customer base of 15.4 million, vs. 11.4 million a year ago. In an interesting footnote, T-Mobile said it received $38 million through the USF program, up from $36 million in the first quarter. A Deutsche Telecom official said the company passed the 15 million customer milestone a year ahead of schedule. T- Mobile earned $717 million on revenue of $2.46 billion. Average revenue per user per month was $55. Pres. Robert Dotson said: “T-Mobile USA captured almost 25% of the net customer additions posted by the 6 national carriers this quarter, and a 7.6% increase in our customer base.”
Charter lost $416 million on nearly $1.24 billion revenue, compared with a loss of $38 million on $1.21 billion revenue in the same quarter last year. Charter said its results were affected by $144 million in payments to settle shareholder lawsuits over its accounting practices. The SEC recently ended its investigation of the matter with an order prohibiting it from future securities violations but no fine. The company didn’t admit any wrongdoing.
Mediacom reported $30 million in earnings on revenue of $272.6 million for the quarter, compared with a loss of $38 million on $252.2 million revenue during the same period last year. CEO Rocco Commisso attributed the results to growth in the data and ad businesses.
A new report on wireless directory assistance (DA) by the Pierz Group, funded in part by wireless carriers, found that Americans appear increasingly open to having their wireless phone numbers listed, especially if they have some privacy safeguards. The survey found specifically that at least a quarter would opt-in to the type of DA under consideration by the CTIA.
Little would change for Cox in terms of FCC reporting requirements if the company were to go private, officials told us. Cox Enterprises (CEI) announced it was proposing to take the company private by buying out the publicly held minority interest (38%)for $32 per share, or about $7.9 billion. Cox CEO James Robbins and other top industry officials have been saying for some time that cable stocks are trading at depressed levels. CEI said in a statement that it wanted to make additional infrastructure investments as the business grows increasingly competitive, and many on Wall St. would prefer immediate returns to more investment and possibly delayed returns.