Liberty’s Strategy Too Far Ahead of Its Time
Pay-TV looks ripe for some tie-ups. And Liberty Media wants to be the one to cable it all together.
Liberty, helmed by Chairman John Malone, has been trying to interest Time Warner Cable in a merger with its 27 percent-owned cable interest, Charter Communications. For Mr. Malone, pushing for consolidation fits with his view that the cable industry should be more collaborative when it comes to confronting several strategic issues. These include the emergence of usage-based pricing for broadband and a consumer shift toward web-based video, which could undermine cable’s current practice of bundling channels.