Lines between segments in the smart home market are blurring, especially for telecom companies and ISPs, Strategy Analytics reported Thursday. Large consumer technology brands will push harder into the smart home market in 2019, with a stronger emphasis on services vs. hardware, SA said. The overall smart home market will need to evolve beyond device-centric roots by taking new roads into existing markets such as hardware-as-a-service sales models, it said. Intelligent home emergence “will take time” as it evolves, said analyst Jack Narcotta. Predictions for 2019: Facebook enters the smart home market through the Portal video calling device; Amazon partners with a major U.S. home insurer; Apple launches a lower cost HomePod; eldercare monitoring becomes an important smart home service; and service providers replace individual offerings by blending entertainment and smart home control packages.

Deny Charter Communications' petition that the FCC deem it faces effective competition, the Massachusetts Department of Telecommunications and Cable (DTC) continues to ask the commission. Hawaii also opposes the cable company's request (see 1811280027). Charter wants out of local regulation in some Massachusetts franchise areas and in Kauai, Hawaii, citing DirecTV Now (see 1809170020). The DTC wants to clarify the definition of a channel in this instance remains the same as under the LEC effective competition test. There's "no discretion to apply a new, different meaning of channel to the LEC Test’s comparable-programming requirement," the department wrote Thursday in docket 18-283. That test requires an LEC provide at least 12 channels of video programming as "channel" is defined, DTC added. "Charter has not carried its burden of demonstrating that AT&T’s DIRECTV NOW offers channels." Charter declined to comment.

Charter Communications joined the UHD Alliance, said a notice in Tuesday’s Federal Register from DOJ’s Antitrust Division. Change-of-membership "written notifications," which UHD sent Nov. 16 to DOJ and the FTC, are required to extend alliance members antitrust protections under the National Cooperative Research and Production Act of 1993, the notice said. "Membership in this group research project remains open, and UHD Alliance intends to file additional written notifications disclosing all changes in membership."

Goodbye, Cable One, hello, Sparklight, as the cable ISP said Tuesday it will rebrand itself with the new name starting next summer. It said its corporate name will remain Cable One. It said new residential internet service plans and pricing will accompany the rebrand.

Taking no position on Charter Communications' petition for effective competition finding in Hawaii and Massachusetts based on existence of DirecTV Now streaming service (see 1809170020), AT&T in an FCC docket 18-283 posting Friday said its DirecTV subsidiary isn't an MVPD as defined by Section 602 of the Communications Act since it doesn't provide a transmission path to subscribers. It said two of the three Cable Act tests for an effective competition finding require cable operators show competition in their franchise areas from MVPDs, and the LEC test in the act doesn't specifically require the LEC or its affiliate be an MVPD. It said courts have long followed statutory interpretation principles that say if language is included in one section of a statute but not another, that exclusion is presumed to be intentional. AT&T said Congress also didn't require the LEC or its affiliate to video programming "channels" as part of the LEC test, only video programing services.

Cable One General Counsel Peter Witty urged the FCC to confirm local communities can't require cable operators with Communications Act Title VI cable franchises also get a franchise or authorization to provide non-cable broadband services, in meetings with aides to Commissioners Brendan Carr and Mike O'Rielly and with Media Bureau Chief Michelle Carey, recounted a docket 05-311 posting Monday. The agency should confirm communities can't demand payment of more franchise fees or right-of-way access fees from cable operators as a condition of providing broadband or VoIP services, the operator said. It decried "never-ending escalation" of station retransmission consent fees

Cable modems that include Chinese parts but are assembled in Mexico are subject to the third tranche of 10 percent Trade Act Section 301 tariffs on Chinese imports, said Customs and Border Protection in a Nov. 27 ruling. The ruling request was submitted by Barnes Richardson lawyer Lawrence Friedman on behalf of Zoom Telephonics. CBP's analysis was on two types of modems -- those that include Wi-Fi gateways and those that don’t. All the components involved are products of China and "bulk-packed board assemblies will be shipped in separate boxes from the remainder of the components including the case components, feet, screws, and labels," CBP said. The assembly work done in Mexico doesn't constitute a "substantial transformation" of the Chinese components, CBP said. The modems are classifiable under subheading 8517.62.0010 and therefore subject to the tariffs imposed Sept. 24, it said. The modems meet the North American Free Trade Agreement’s tariff shift requirement and are a product of Mexico for marking purposes, CBP said.

Former Cablevision CEO James Dolan will pay a $609,810 fine for failing to report in a timely manner his acquisition of voting securities in Madison Square Garden Co. (MSG), where he's executive chairman, the FTC said Thursday. In a complaint filed Thursday with U.S. District Court in the District of Columbia, DOJ said Dolan had violated Hart-Scott-Rodino Act reporting requirements in the past and that he did so again in 2017 when he acquired 591 shares through vested restricted stock units but didn't file the required, timely paperwork. Justice said the complaint and accompanying proposed settlement, subject to court approval, come at the FTC's request. "Any shareholder whose stockholdings exceed certain thresholds is required to make an HSR filing," MSG emailed. "Debevoise & Plimpton is the law firm responsible for making timely HSR filings relating to Jim Dolan’s MSG stock. Debevoise inadvertently missed a required HSR filing deadline, for a second time, which resulted in a fine by the FTC. Debevoise agreed to pay the fine as a result of their mistake.”

Massachusetts state lawmakers and officials are lobbying against the Further NPRM that would treat cable operators' in-kind contributions required by local franchise authorities as franchise fees subject to a cap (see 1811150027), with a set of similarly worded docket 05-311 filings posted Thursday. The FCC "lacks authority to impair private franchise contracts Section 622 of the Cable Act defines 'franchise fees' " and hasn't the right to redefine, State Rep. William Galvin, D-Avon, said in a typical letter.

Comcast and Charter Communications seek rehearings en banc by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals of decisions last month allowing claims of discrimination in their programming choices to go forward (see 1811190023). Comcast in a docket 16-56479 petition (in Pacer) Monday said the 9th Circuit's interpretation of Civil Rights Act Section 1981 warrants rehearing en banc because it conflicts with other circuit courts, including the Supreme Court. Charter, in a similar petition (in Pacer) in docket 17-55723, called it "a textbook case for rehearing en banc" by deviating from Supreme Court precedent. Counsel for appellants Entertainment Studios Networks and the National Association of African American Owned Media didn't comment.