Comcast Corporation, incorporated and headquartered in Philadelphia, is the largest American multinational telecommunications and media conglomerate. The corporation is the second-largest broadcasting and cable television company in the world by revenue. It is the third-largest pay-TV company, the second-largest cable TV company by subscribers, and the largest home Internet service provider in the United States. Comcast is additionally the nation's third-largest home telephone service provider. It provides services to U.S. residential and commercial customers in 40 states and the District of Columbia. As the owner of the international media company NBCUniversal since 2011, Comcast is also a high-volume producer of feature films for theatrical exhibition and television programming, and a theme park operator.
Rouzbeh Yassini, known as the "Father of the Cable Modem", is an Iranian-American inventor, engineer, and author, who has gained international reputation as a "broadband visionary" for his pioneering work in broadband industry and inventing the cable modem, establishing the cable modem industry standards (DOCSIS) through Cable Television Laboratories (CableLabs), the Society of Cable Telecommunications Engineers (SCTE) and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). He is executive director of the University Of New Hampshire Broadband Center Of Excellence and Founder and board member of the YAS Foundation. Yassini is the author of “Planet Broadband”, a humanized look at broadband technology and its contributions to the society, as well as “Broadband Intelligent Series”, a series of white papers on digital services. He is a worldwide speaker and is often interviewed and quoted in the press for his vision on the future of broadband. His lifetime vision and dream is that all the people in the world have ubiquitous access to the broadband and be connected all the time. He believes that broadband connectivity is a fundamental right for all the human beings, what he has referred to it frequently as "Broadband Equality". Yassini was founder, CEO, and president of LANcity, the early pioneer in cable modems. He has worked with Cable Television Laboratories, Inc. (CableLabs) a research arm of the cable television industry in charge of the DOCSIS and on CableHome projects as the cable industry's point man on standardizing the cable modem's global footprint. He served as a senior executive consultant to the cable industry's CEOs while being president and CEO of YAS Corporation. He also has worked with Comcast and Cablevision on numerous programs relating to innovation of broadband technologies. From 2004 to 2007, Yassini worked with the CTO's office at Comcast to create the first industry standard IP-Set top Box specification known as the RNG specification. He has been involved in managing and advising companies ranging from $100 million to $50 billion and served as member of the board of directors on BAS, TrueChat, and Entropic from 2001 to 2008, and UPC Technical Advisory Committee. He created and chaired the Vendor and Operator Executive Advisory Forum of the U.S. Cable Center. He was a member of the Liberty Global Inc. (LGI) advisory technology board from 2001 to 2017. Yassini was director of Visteon from January 2015 to December 2020. As CEO and Chairman of Irystec, a Montreal-based firm founded in 2015 specializing in perceptual display processing technology, Yassini was able to successfully have the french auto company Faurecia acquire the company in 2020, despite the Covid pandemic. Working for more than 30 years in the broadband industry and achieving major accomplishments, Yassini received many awards from different organizations. He was named multiple times as CED Broadband 50 designate. CED Magazine named him “1998 Man of the Year” for creating and fostering the multibillion-dollar cable modem broadband industry. The National Cable & Telecommunications Association (NCTA) awarded Yassini with a 2004 Vanguard Award, the Cable Industry's highest honor in recognition of his contributions and dedication to the industry. The Cable Television Pioneers also inducted Yassini into the class of 2012 for his tremendous and meaningful contributions to the cable industry. He is a member of the Lane Department Academy as well as West Virginia University Academy of Distinguished Alumni.
US West, Inc., doing business as U S West, was one of seven Regional Bell Operating Companies, created in 1983 under the Modification of Final Judgement, a case related to the antitrust breakup of AT&T. US West provided local telephone and intraLATA long-distance services, data transmission services, cable television services, wireless communications services and related telecommunications products to defined areas in Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Iowa, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oregon, South Dakota, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming. US West was a public company traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol "USW" with headquarters at 1801 California Street in Denver, Colorado.
Tele-Communications, Inc. (TCI) was a cable television provider in the United States, and for most of its history was controlled by Bob Magness and John Malone.
Altice USA, Inc., commonly known as Altice, is an American cable television provider with headquarters in New York City, owned by the Franco-Israeli businessman Patrick Drahi. It delivers pay television, Internet access, telephone services, and original television content to approximately 4.9 million residential and business customers in 21 states.
Charter Communications, Inc., is an American telecommunications and mass media company with services branded as Spectrum. With over 32 million customers in 41 states, it is the largest cable operator in the United States by subscribers, just ahead of Comcast, and the largest pay TV operator ahead of Comcast and AT&T. Charter is the fifth-largest telephone provider based on number of residential lines.
Scientific Atlanta, Inc. was a Georgia, United States–based manufacturer of cable television, telecommunications, and broadband equipment. Scientific Atlanta was founded in 1951 by a group of engineers from the Georgia Institute of Technology, and was purchased by Cisco Systems in 2005 for $6.9 billion after Cisco received antitrust clearance for the purchase. The Cisco acquisition of Scientific Atlanta was ranked in the top 10 of largest technology acquisitions in history and was Cisco's largest acquisition to date. Prior to the purchase, Scientific Atlanta had been a Fortune 500 company and was one of the top 25 largest corporations in Georgia.
Comcast Cable Communications, LLC, doing business as Xfinity, is an American telecommunications business segment and division of Comcast Corporation used to market consumer cable television, internet, telephone, and wireless services provided by the company. The brand was first introduced in 2010; prior to that, these services were marketed primarily under the Comcast name.
Time Warner Cable, Inc. (TWC) was an American cable television company. Before it was acquired by Charter Communications on May 18, 2016, it was ranked the second largest cable company in the United States by revenue behind only Comcast, operating in 29 states. Its corporate headquarters were located in the Time Warner Center in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, with other corporate offices in Stamford, Connecticut; Charlotte, North Carolina; and Herndon, Virginia.
In telecommunications, quadruple play or quad play is a marketing term combining the triple play service of broadband Internet access, television and telephone with wireless service provisions. This service set is also sometimes referred to as "The Fantastic Four".
Dex Media, Inc. was a print and interactive marketing company. It was formed in 2002 by a consortium led by The Carlyle Group to acquire the operations of QwestDex from Qwest Communications International. The company went public in 2004 and was acquired by R.H. Donnelley in 2006, which became DEX One in 2010.
Qwest Corporation is a former Regional Bell Operating Company owned by Lumen Technologies. It was formerly named U S WEST Communications, Inc. from 1991 to 2000, and also formerly named Mountain States Telephone and Telegraph Company from 1911 to 1991. It includes the former operations of Malheur Bell, Northwestern Bell and Pacific Northwest Bell as well.
RCN Corporation, originally Residential Communications Network, founded in 1993 and based in Princeton, New Jersey, was the first American facilities-based ("overbuild") provider of bundled telephone, cable television, and internet service delivered over its own fiber-optic local network as well as dialup and DSL Internet service to consumers in the Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York City, the Lehigh Valley in eastern Pennsylvania, and Washington, D.C. areas.
Qwest Communications International, Inc. was a United States telecommunications carrier. Qwest provided local service in 14 western and midwestern U.S. states: Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Iowa, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oregon, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming.
Lumen Technologies, Inc. is an American telecommunications company headquartered in Monroe, Louisiana, that offers communications, network services, security, cloud solutions, voice, and managed services. The company was a member of the Fortune 500 and the S&P 500 index from 1999 until 2023. Its communications services include local and long-distance voice, broadband, Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS), private line, Ethernet, hosting, data integration, video, network, public access, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), information technology, and other ancillary services. Lumen also serves global enterprise customers across North America, Latin America, EMEA, and Asia Pacific.
Bresnan Communications was an American cable television provider formed by William Bresnan in 1984. It originally operated cable systems on Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Over the next fourteen years, its operations spread to Minnesota Wisconsin, Mississippi and Georgia. In 1994, the company added international operations in Chile and Poland, with the creation of Bresnan International Partners. The company reached 400,000 subscribers after purchasing systems from TCI. When AT&T acquired TCI, Bresnan began to consider an IPO. Before that could occur, Paul Allen's Charter Communications made an offer, and purchased Bresnan's U.S. cable systems for $3.1 billion, organizing them under Charter Communications' umbrella.
The history of AT&T dates back to the invention of the telephone. The Bell Telephone Company was established in 1877 by Alexander Graham Bell, who obtained the first US patent for the telephone, and his father-in-law, Gardiner Greene Hubbard. Bell and Hubbard also established American Telephone and Telegraph Company in 1885, which acquired the Bell Telephone Company and became the primary telephone company in the United States. This company maintained an effective monopoly on local telephone service in the United States until anti-trust regulators agreed to allow AT&T to retain Western Electric and enter general trades computer manufacture and sales in return for its offer to split the Bell System by divesting itself of ownership of the Bell Operating Companies in 1982.
Comcast Business is a subsidiary of Comcast, which, through several iterations, has handled the sales, marketing, and delivery of internet, phone, and cable television to businesses. In 2012, Comcast Business grew by 34%, the fastest growth of any of Comcast's products in 2012, reaching $2.4 billion in revenue. In 2013, Comcast Business generated $3.2 billion in revenue, an increase of 26% over 2012 revenue.
Cablevision Systems Corporation was an American cable television company with systems serving areas surrounding New York City. It was the fifth-largest cable provider and ninth-largest television provider in the United States. Throughout its existence and in its final years, Cablevision exclusively served customers residing in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and a small part of Pennsylvania. However, at one time it provided service in as many as 19 states. Cablevision also offered high-speed Internet connections, digital cable, and VoIP phone service through its Optimum brand name. Cablevision also offered a WiFi-only mobile phone service dubbed Freewheel.
Optimum is an American telecommunications brand owned and operated by Altice USA. It is the fourth largest cable provider in the United States and a Fortune 500 company. Optimum offers Internet, television, mobile and home phone serving in Arizona, Arkansas, California, Connecticut, Idaho, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey, Long Island and New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Texas, and West Virginia.
