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Frontier pitches UVerse's Connecticut expansion [New Haven Register, Conn. :: ](New Haven Register (CT) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) June 27--NEW BRITAIN -- Frontier Communications plans to expand the reach of AT&T's UVerse if Connecticut utility regulators approve the Stamford-based company's acquisition of the telecommunications giant land line phone network and television offering. Ken Arndt, president of Frontier's eastern region, said the company hopes to add 100,000 households to its UVerse subscriber base initially. Arndt said the expansion will occur both in towns that already have UVerse subscribers as well as in towns that don't currently have the television service. AT&T does not release the number of subscribers it has for UVerse in any of the states where it offers the television service. Arndt's comments came during the first of four days of hearings before Connecticut's Public Utilities Regulatory Authority. PURA, along with the Federal Communications Commission, must approve Frontier's $2 billion deal with AT&T, which was announced in December. Frontier officials said the UVerse channel line in Connecticut will remain largely the same if the deal is approved. Arndt said the company hopes to close the deal by Oct. 1. "That will give us three months of running the company before the next budget cycle starts," he said. Frontier executives reassured PURA Commissioners Arthur House and John Betkoski that it plans to keep employee levels in Connecticut at current levels. An agreement announced Wednesday by Frontier and Local 1298 of the Communications Workers of America, which represents unionized AT&T workers, calls for the addition of 85 union jobs, with 75 of those coming within six months of the completion of the deal. Frontier's corporate headquarters will remain in Stamford if the deal is approved. The company will add a regional headquarters in New Haven where AT&T's Connecticut headquarters is currently located and will have its Connecticut base of operations in Hartford. The regional operations headquarters will not only oversee work done in Connecticut, but in New York and Pennsylvania where Frontier also operates. For much of the day-long hearing, PURA staffers pressed Frontier officials on whether the company had the financial capability to run the company after paying AT&T $2 billion. At one point, a Frontier executive bristled when a PURA staffer asked whether the company would consent to both financial and management audits in the aftermath of a regulatory approval of the deal. Arndt said that while Frontier has a shareholder base to satisfy, the company will not do so by short changing investment in the network it is acquiring in Connecticut. Last year, he said Frontier invested $635 million in its business while paying out $400 million to shareholders. "The focus on (capital) investment is based on the need for speed and capacity of the network as well as where we think we have ability to take market share," Arndt said. PURA's hearing on the deal continues Friday. Call Luther Turmelle at 203-789-5706. ___ (c)2014 the New Haven Register (New Haven, Conn.) Visit the New Haven Register (New Haven, Conn.) at www.nhregister.com Distributed by MCT Information Services |