Charter/Disney Deal Has Broadband Implications for Cable Operators: Dell'Oro

Charter Communications' carriage deal struck with Disney last month (see 2309110034) is a road map that can point to broadband benefits for other cable operators and is potentially a way of retaining broadband subscribers in the face of fiber overbuild and fixed wireless competition, Dell'Oro Group Jeff Heynen blogged Monday. The spectrum and bandwidth freed up for Charter in the deal means more bandwidth available for broadband subs, he said. That bandwidth reclamation could be significant for cable operators that never deployed switched digital video, he said. As more video viewers switch to over-the-top services, cable operators are increasingly moving to a role as content aggregators as a means of trying to ensure those nonlinear video subs remain broadband customers, he said.