Dish Blitzes FCC With Block Comcast/TWC Message

The clock may be stopped on the Federal Communications Commission's review of the Comcast/Time Warner Cable merger, but Dish Network gave the commission a lot to chew on.

In what amounted to a full-court press, Dish execs, led by Chairman Charlie Ergen, met with a laundry list of FCC officials Oct. 21-22 (more than three dozen on Oct. 21 alone) either in person or by phone asking them not to approve the deal, which it has formally requested in a petition to deny. The officials included commissioners and bureau chiefs and bureau staffers as well as special counsels and advisors. The pitch emphasized what they said would be the combined company's control of half the broadband pipes with speeds sufficient to provide the 25 Mbps that FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler has suggested are the new table stakes for defining access to high-speed broadband. Dish suggested that both companies are working on over-the-top services that would otherwise compete if they did not merge.