Cox Communications will begin building a mobile network in 2009. But the move has many wondering if Cox can trump the seeming cableco-in-wireless curse. Stephen Bye, vice president of wireless at Cox, was quoted in the press this week as saying that this effort will be different from the myriad failed attempts at wireless in the past because the MSO is fully integrating wireless into its core business, rather than having it be an add-on.
It’s about time. Can any provider really be a serious competitor if it’s ignoring mobility?
Cablecos getting into mobile is nothing new — remember Pivot, the failed joint venture the top MSOs had with Sprint-Nextel Corp.? Don’t forget too, that several of them were investors in the Clearwire-Sprint XOHM joint venture, now just Clearwire. And what about the standing MVNO offer the cablecos have with the new Clearwire to rebrand WiMAX services? Some MSOs have even been known to own spectrum — Cox being one.
But here’s the deal: There’s been very little fruit from the cableco-in-wireless rumblings, only a series of strategy announcements, a service launch or two, then a seemingly inevitable pulling of the plug. It’s almost as if the space is cursed for these operators — failure at the end of every attempt. But the quad play is ever important, particularly considering the continuing exodus on the part of consumers from home landlines, and the formidable market clout of integrated competitor incumbents like AT&T. And with femtocells becoming commercially viable, a cable company could leverage its considerable home broadband install base to launch a bundled wireless-cable modem offer that would be loaded with synergies.
Cox looks to be one of the first to get serious about mobility, with plans to build a CDMA network in its $500 million-worth of advanced wireless services (AWS) spectrum, which covers 76 percent of its wireline footprint. Sprint will assist as a roaming partner to fill in the rest.
Cox also said it has plans to migrate to LTE eventually.
