Paragon Cable

Last updated
Paragon Cable
Industry Cable television
Founded1980s
Defunct2000
FatePurchased
Successor Time Warner Cable
Bright House Networks
Charter Communications
Headquarters Minneapolis, Minnesota
Parent Houston Industries

Paragon Cable was a cable system based in Minneapolis, Minnesota and was owned by Houston Industries.

Contents

Beginnings

Formed in the 1980s, Paragon Cable was the largest cable provider in Minnesota with 177,100 subscribers in the Twin Cities and South Central Minnesota. In the latter years, it has expanded to serve other states, such as California, Oregon, Florida, Texas and in the Borough of Manhattan in New York City above west 79 Street and East 86 Streets (absorbing the former TelePrompter/Group W Cable franchise area).

Time Warner merger

In 1995, Houston Industries, Time Warner, and KBLCOM, Inc. inked an agreement, in which Time Warner Cable would acquire all assets of Paragon Cable and the entire stock of KBLCOM. [1] The deal was finalized in 1999 and all of the Paragon assets were transferred into Time Warner's portfolio, however some headends (like one in Irving, Texas) kept Paragon Cable's verbal ident until late 2000. As for the assets in Florida, they were spun off in 2002 to a new company, Bright House Networks. Some former Paragon systems, such as in Oregon and Texas, would later be sold or swapped to AT&T Broadband, who in turn sold it to Comcast in 2003. Coincidentally, the North Texas cluster formerly served by Comcast was swapped back to Time Warner Cable in August 2006; the Minnesota cluster was transferred to Comcast as part of this transaction.

In 2016, Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks were acquired by Charter Communications, and was absorbed into the Spectrum brand.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Comcast</span> American multinational telecommunications conglomerate

Comcast Corporation, headquartered in Philadelphia, is the largest American multinational telecommunications conglomerate. It is the second-largest broadcasting and cable television company in the world by revenue, the largest pay-TV company, the largest cable TV company and largest home Internet service provider in the United States, and 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 parent company of the international media company NBCUniversal since 2011, Comcast is a producer of feature films for theatrical exhibition, and over-the-air and cable television programming.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Turner Broadcasting System</span> Former American media conglomerate

Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. was an American television and media conglomerate. Founded by Ted Turner and based in Atlanta, Georgia, it merged with Time Warner on October 10, 1996. As of April 2022, its assets are now owned by Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD). The headquarters of Turner's properties are largely located at the CNN Center in Downtown Atlanta, and the Turner Broadcasting campus off Techwood Drive in Midtown Atlanta, which also houses Turner Studios. Some of their operations are housed within WBD's corporate and global headquarters inside 30 Hudson Yards in Manhattan's West Side district, and at 230 Park Avenue South in Midtown Manhattan, both in New York City, respectively.

Rogers Cable Inc. is Canada's largest cable television service provider with about 2.25 million television customers, and over 930,000 Internet subscribers, primarily in Southern & Eastern Ontario, New Brunswick and Newfoundland and Labrador. Rogers Cable is a division of Rogers Communications Partnership, itself wholly owned by Rogers Communications Inc.

US West, Inc. 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.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shaw Communications</span> Canadian communications company

Shaw Communications Inc. is a Canadian telecommunications company which provides telephone, Internet, television, and mobile services. Headquartered in Calgary, Alberta, Shaw provides home telecommunications services primarily in Alberta and British Columbia and satellite television nationally. It also operates smaller cable television systems in Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and Northern Ontario. Shaw provides mobile services through its subsidiary Freedom Mobile, under both the Freedom and Shaw Mobile brands, in areas of Alberta, British Columbia, and Southern Ontario. The company's chief competitor for home telecommunications in western Canada is Telus Communications.

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 second-largest cable operator in the United States by subscribers, just behind Comcast, and the third-largest pay TV operator behind Comcast and AT&T. Charter is the fifth-largest telephone provider based on number of residential lines.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">TXCN</span> Television channel

Texas Cable News (TXCN) was an American regional cable news television channel that was owned by the Gannett Company. The channel operated out of offices in Dallas, Texas, located on Young Street in the city's downtown district.

Storer Broadcasting, Inc. was an American company which owned several television and radio stations in the Northeastern United States. It was incorporated in Ohio 1927, and was broken up in 1986.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Time Warner Cable</span> Former American cable telecommunications company

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.

Bright House Networks, LLC also simply known as Bright House, was an American telecom company. Prior to its purchase by Charter Communications, it was the tenth-largest multichannel video service provider and the 6th largest cable internet provider in the United States. The company served more than 2.2 million customers.

Centel Corporation was an American telecommunications company, with primary interests in providing basic telephone service, cellular phone service and cable television service.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">RCN Corporation</span> American cable television, telephone, and Internet service provider

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.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jones Intercable</span>

Jones Intercable was a cable television company founded by Glenn R. Jones in 1970. Jones, already a cable television veteran, had bought his first cable system in Georgetown, Colorado after taking a $400 loan on his Volkswagen. The company expanded rapidly and by 1994 it had 1.4 million subscribers. In 1995, the company was 30 percent owned by Bell Canada International.

MediaOne Group, Inc. was created by US WEST Inc, one of the original Baby Bells Regional Bell Operating Companies, acquisition of Boston-based Continental Cable and combined with its previously acquired Atlanta-based Wometco/GTC. Wometco/GTC adopted the MediaOne name a year earlier. Media One Group was acquired in 2000 by AT&T Broadband, which was subsequently acquired by Comcast in 2002.

Major League Baseball games not broadcast exclusively by its media partners are televised by regional sports networks, which present sports programming of interest to their respective region. Most MLB broadcasters are members of chains such as NBC Sports Regional Networks, Bally Sports, and AT&T SportsNet, although several teams are broadcast by regional networks that are independent of these chains. Some teams own partial or majority stakes in their regional broadcaster.

The US Cable Group was a cable television provider that at its peak served over 240,000 subscribers in twelve states. It was among the top 35 cable providers in the nation and had cable systems in Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey, New Mexico, South Carolina, Texas and Wisconsin.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fox Sports Houston</span> Television channel

Fox Sports Houston was an American regional sports network that was owned by Fox Cable Networks, a unit of the Fox Entertainment Group subsidiary of News Corporation, and operated as an affiliate of Fox Sports Networks. The channel, which operated out of facilities based in downtown Houston, Texas, originally began in April 2005 as a sub-feed of sister network Fox Sports Southwest and became a separate 24-hour channel on January 12, 2009.

Cable Atlantic was a cable television provider serving much of the population of the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador. The company's primary owner throughout its history was Danny Williams, although ownership was shared with other investors from time to time.

TelePrompTer Corporation was an American media company that existed from approximately 1950 until 1981. The company was named for its eponymous primary product, a display device invented by Hubert Schlafly which scrolls text to people on video or giving speeches, replacing cue cards or scripts. Branded as the "TelePrompTer", the name has become a genericized trademark as "teleprompter".

References