New Charter Is Approved: What Our Future Looks Like

“Today, we’re proud to announce that Charter, Time Warner Cable (TWC) and Bright House Networks (BHN) have received the final approvals we need to combine all three companies and form New Charter.

We’re excited to move forward, but we’re also proud that the regulatory approval process reinforced our longstanding consumer-friendly and pro-broadband policies and will mean good things for all the new customers we’ll serve.

As part of obtaining approval from federal and state regulators, we’ve agreed to certain conditions, many of which were derived from commitments offered proactively or are a continuation of practices we already have in place.

Specifically, we’ve committed to building out high-speed broadband service to underserved and unserved communities across the country and to offer to eligible consumers the fastest stand-alone low-cost high-speed broadband program of any major service provider.

As viewers increasingly use online content to watch their favorite shows or movies, we’ve agreed to maintain our policy of no data caps or usage based billing, a practice used by some companies to charge customers based on how much data they’re using each month.

We’re also excited to continue to rollout our state-of-the-art, cloud-based programming guide that could enable TVs to access online video content along with cable channels for a seamless viewing experience.

We’ll be making good on our commitment to enhance customer service, including by creating thousands of American jobs and bringing jobs from TWC’s overseas call centers back to America so that our new and growing customer base receives customer care that meets their expectations.

Because we believe in an open Internet, we’ve volunteered to follow the Federal Communications Commission’s “open Internet” rules, regardless of whether they’re required of all companies.

During our review process, we were proud of the support we received from community and advocacy groups across the country. Organizations like the National Urban League, the League of United Latin American Citizens, and Asian Americans Advancing Justice endorsed our transaction because of our commitment to enhancing diversity, both within Charter as a company and in the products we offer our customers. For instance, our Board of Directors will feature new members who increase its diversity, reflect the diversity of the communities we serve, and we’re expanding the amount of African American and Hispanic programming we air, building upon our practice of making available to our customers diverse and independent programming.  We also will appoint a Chief Diversity Officer responsible for making sure our workplace policies reflect our values and the customers we serve.

But we’re confident that our new company will mean great things for our current customers and those we’ll have the pleasure of serving in the future.”