A day after Charter Communications announced a joint venture with Comcast to create a streaming platform based on the latter’s Flex broadband-only product, Chairman and CEO Tom Rutledge said that he sees a day when the bulk of its Spectrum video customers receive service via internet protocol delivery. He called the Comcast partnership a step in that direction.
Charter looks poised to go over the top, with Chairman Tom Rutledge telling investors that he “likes the Comcast model of putting its platform on televisions.”
Charter Communications Chairman and CEO Thomas Rutledge’s compensation at the U.S. cable and Internet giant rose sharply from $8.74 million in 2019 due to option awards figuring in his overall pay package.
Charter CEO: Video No Longer Standalone Product
Charter President and CEO Tom Rutledge made it clear, amid another quarter of lost video subscribers, that his company’s video business was no longer built to go it alone. “We’re going to use video aggressively. But what we’re saying is, it really isn’t a standalone product in its current situation,” Rutledge said during Tuesday’s earnings call.
The head of the station group takes to his stations’ websites to offer his take on the blackouts and retransmission consent negotiations with the cable carrier (locally Charter) that broke down over the weekend and caused blackouts of 11 Northwest stations in nine markets. He points the finger directly at Spectrum CEO Tom Rutledge.
Using someone else’s credentials to stream for free will soon be a $10 billion problem for pay TV companies. Tom Rutledge has had enough. The CEO of Charter Communications, which sells cable TV under the Spectrum name, is leading an industrywide effort to crack down on password sharing.
Exclusives
Even though Charter Communications is losing video subscribers, CEO Tom Rutledge says he doesn’t worry about the growing number of lower-priced streaming services such as AT&T’s DirecTV Now and Dish Network’s Sling TV. “If you take a look at the evidence so far, the current [over the top] offerings just seem to be cannibalizing the same satellite providers’ own base. It’s just a shift.”
Charter Communications CEO Tom Rutledge is unimpressed with all of the hoopla surrounding planned virtual pay TV services — including ones planned from Hulu and AT&T’s DirecTV Now that promise to offer superior value vs. cable.
Charter CEO Tom Rutledge met with FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler Wednesday to discuss “the public interest benefits of its proposed transaction with Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks and the ways in which it will enhance competition,” according to a filing with the FCC by Charter.
Wall Street is fired up about consolidation in the cable industry and is betting on Charter Communications chief Tom Rutledge to lead the latest deal-making — potentially a merger involving Cablevision or Time Warner Cable. Although Charter is half the size of Time Warner, the fourth-largest pay TV provider, Wall Street would like to see the two combined under the leadership of Rutledge.
BTIG’s Rich Greenfield, one of the most prominent analysts covering the media and telecommunications industry, blasted the cable operator’s cloud of secrecy over the reasons behind departure of its COO Tom Rutledge, who Monday announced he was taking the president-CEO position at Charter Communications.
Cable operator Charter said Monday that it has hired former Cablevision executive Tom Rutledge as president-CEO following last week’s announcement that he would be leaving Cablevision as COO.
The surprise resignation of Cablevision System Corp.’s top cable executive Tom Rutledge sparked Wall Street and investor speculation on Thursday that the Dolan family-controlled company could become an acquisition target.
