The proposed $45 billion merger between pay TV and Internet service giants Comcast and Time Warner Cable has been met with staunch opposition from consumers, rivals and several watchdog groups. On Wednesday, Comcast will make its case to the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee in an effort to convince regulators and the general public that the merger benefits not just the companies involved and their shareholders, but also American consumers.
Comcast filed with the Department of Justice and the Federal Communications Commission on Tuesday — ironically, on the same day it was named the worst company in America by Consumerist — and on Wednesday, the company’s Executive Vice President and Chief Diversity Officer in Public Policy David Cohen will testify in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
The full text of Cohen’s written statement can be found here.
In a post on Comcast’s blog on Wednesday, Cohen wrote that he plans to outline the “many ways that the proposed transaction to combine Time Warner Cable with Comcast will benefit millions of Americans.” He said that Comcast operates in a competitive ecosystem and listed AT&T, Verizon, DirecTV, DISH, Netflix, Amazon, Apple, Sony, Google and Facebook among Comcast’s competition.
“Our investment will bring Time Warner Cable customers faster Internet speeds, more programming choices, next-generation TV, and more robust Wi-Fi,” Cohen wrote. “These aren’t just empty promises. We have a proven record of investing billions in new technologies and networks. We’re leaders in high speed internet – and with today’s Internet speed announcement, we’ve increased the speed of our high speed data service 13 times in 12 years.”
He continued, “We carry more than 160 independent networks and we committed to launch 10 new independent cable channels in 2011, eight of which were to be minority owned (five of these ten networks have already launched). We’re making the future of TV a reality with our acclaimed X1 entertainment operating system and our recent launch of cloud DVR. We have the fastest in-home Wifi to power the next generation of entertainment, and we just announced the deployment of more than a million Wi-Fi hotspots coast to coast. Business customers will also benefit from a stronger new entrant offering more choice and better prices.”
Cohen’s full post can be read on the Comcast blog, which is linked below in our source section.
