Charter rolls out new Spectrum pricing, internet speeds

Chartered Communications Chief executive Chris Winfrey said he wanted customers to think of reliability and trustworthiness when they thought of cable and broadband providers.

The cable giant told CNBC it will unveil a series of changes on Monday to achieve that goal, including introducing new plans and pricing, increasing network speeds, offering credits for service outages and promising improved reliability for customers.

Charter provides broadband, cable and mobile services and is known to customers as Spectrum.

The launch comes as Charter and its industry peers contend with several trends: slowing broadband customer growth, continued losses in cable TV bundles, and a young but rapidly expanding mobile business.

“It's hard to be loved when you're providing a critical service to a home that's physical infrastructure that costs over $100 a month,” Winfrey told CNBC. “In terms of the problem, there's Someone has to come into your home…like an electrician or a plumber.”

The first step in changing unfavorable consumer perceptions is “pricing and packaging that creates more value than can be replicated anywhere else in the market,” he said.

Spectrum says its 500Mbps internet plans cost as little as $30 per month when bundled with two mobile lines or cable TV, and 1GB service costs $40 per month. The company is also increasing baseline internet speeds for existing customers for free.

The company also said it plans to communicate costs in advance. Under the new plan, taxes and fees are included, there are no annual contracts and pricing is guaranteed for up to three years, the company said. Charter has even eliminated the 99 cents it used to add to most Spectrum pricing.

In addition, Spectrum also promises to provide automatic points to customers when the company's customer service fails to live up to its promises, or when the company's customer service fails to live up to its promises, or there is an network outage due to company issues that is beyond the customer's control and lasts for more than two years. Service problems caused by weather, natural disasters, or power outages are not included.

The company said Life Unlimited – Spectrum's new platform for online, mobile and TV services – will launch in 41 of its states this week.

“We want to make a bold statement about our commitment and our capabilities,” Winfrey said. “We also want to recognize that we are not perfect and we are putting pressure on ourselves, specific pressure, to make sure that we are a better service operator every month, every year from now on.”

The changes announced are among Charter's biggest moves since Winfrey He will take office as CEO in December 2022.

he Already following Tom Rutledge held the position for ten years, passing acquisition In 2016, Winfrey served as financial officer of Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks and led the merger.

Winfrey reviewed the various investments and advances cable companies have made over the years: namely broadband, pay-TV bundles and landline and mobile phone businesses.

“Despite all the value that the industry has brought over the years, and the investment in service and reliability that we have made, we don't always get the full recognition that we deserve, and in some cases we do get the recognition that we deserve. Because we could have done better,” Winfrey said.

By the time he took over, it was clear that the cable business was unlikely to return to growth.

Winfrey is a low-profile and little-known executive in the media industry, but he was rocky from the start.

At its Investor Day in December 2022, Charter announced an aggressive capital investment plan that includes investing $5.5 billion over three years in its broadband infrastructure network. The higher-than-expected spending, amid growing competition among 5G wireless providers, set off alarm bells on Wall Street and sent shares lower.

Charter's stock price has been volatile in recent years. On September 12, 2021, the stock price was $787.12. Friday's closing price was $340.17.

This is partly due to the inclusion of Charter and Comcast The company has been struggling, according to its earnings report. Increased competition from wireless companies, e.g. AT&T and Verizon High interest rates, which slow down home sales, are also contributing to the economic stagnation.

MoffettNathanson said the third quarter was the worst quarter for subscriber losses in the broadband industry. Charter lost 149,000 customers as of June 30 and had a total of 30.4 million residential and small business broadband customers, according to its second-quarter earnings report.

While the losses weren't as severe as analysts feared, Charter's bright spot for growth is now its mobile business. roll out 2018.

Late 2022, Charter declare Its “Spectrum One” plan bundles broadband, Wi-Fi and mobile services together for the first time, with promotions at competitive prices and, in some cases, free mobile lines.

“The 'Spectrum One' promotion will almost certainly be a home run for the wireless space,” analyst Craig Moffett said in a July research note. “Although It was initially thought to be shockingly aggressive, but in fact, it was a pretty tame offer.”

Moffett called operations an “undervalued growth engine” for Charter, not just because of customer additions but also growth in average revenue per user (ARPU), a metric often used by cable companies.

Winfrey does not expect ARPU to be affected by the new promotions.

“When I think of Wall Street, I think of customers,” Winfrey said. “If you are customer-centric, provide great customer service, save them money, provide value, then your capital markets strategy, your regulatory strategy, all of that will fall into place.”

Customers of all providers, including Charter, are rapidly abandoning pay TV. But the company has been vocal about its efforts to protect the business, especially under Winfrey.

The most important moment is 2023 disneyCharter's customer-owned networks were down, and Winfrey called the pay-TV ecosystem “broken” as she pushed for a revised deal with Disney.

latest discount and Warner Bros. Discovery and AMC Networks yes Renew in advance. This is relatively rare in an industry where transportation negotiations often go to the last minute.

Last year's charter also here we go Offers its own streaming device, called Xumo, through a joint venture with Comcast. The device gets rid of the cable box and gives consumers a way to access cable TV and streaming apps in one place.

“We still have hurdles to overcome,” Winfrey said, noting that Charter aims to offer all ad-supported streaming apps in the first half of 2025 owned by major programmers in cable bundle negotiations.

However, NBCUniversal's Peacock still doesn't belong on that list. A representative for Charter said the company does not discuss renewals and declined to comment.

Reveal: Comcast is the parent company of NBCUniversal, which owns CNBC.

Correction: The chart in this article showing changes in residential Internet users has been updated.