Wide Open West

"WOW!" redirects here. For other uses, see Wow (disambiguation).
WideOpenWest, Inc.
Company typePrivate
IndustryTelecommunications
PredecessorAmericast, Knology
FoundedNovember 1996; 29 years ago (1996-11) in Denver, Colorado
Headquarters
Denver, Colorado
,
U.S.
Area served
Key people
Frank van der Post (CEO)
Patrick Bratton (CFO)
Aaron Brace (CTIO)
Courtland Madock (CCO)
Heather McCallion (CXO)
ProductsBroadband
Cable television
IPTV
Digital cable
Digital telephone
HDTV
Internet
Internet security
VoIP phone
BrandsWOW!
RevenueIncreaseUS$1,148.4 million(2020)[1]
DecreaseUS$22.2 million(2020)[2]
DecreaseUS$14.4 million(2020)[2]
Total assetsIncreaseUS$2,487.0 million(2020)[1]
SubsidiariesBroadstripe
Websitewww.wowway.com

WideOpenWest, Inc. (doing business as WOW![3]) is the eighth largest cable operator in the United States with their network passing 1.9 million homes and businesses.[4] With 538,100 subscribers as of November 2022,[5] the company offers landline telephone, cable television, and broadband Internet services.[6]

History

Founded in 1996 in Denver, Colorado, WOW! built a network and was serving about 200 people in the Denver area five years later. Years later, Oak Hill Capital Partners and ABRY Partners sold the firm to Avista Capital Partners, without disclosing the terms of the sale.[7]

In November 2001, it purchased Americast, an overbuild system in the Midwest built and operated by Ameritech New Media for an undisclosed amount per subscriber, estimated to have been at a cost of $600 per sub.[citation needed]

Although it currently does not operate in some of these areas, the Pennsylvania-based company began serving the more than 310,000 customers acquired through the purchase and previously served by Americast in the metropolitan areas surrounding Chicago, Cleveland, Columbus, Detroit, Denver, and Evansville.[8]

On August 23, 2011, Wave Broadband and WOW! announced that they entered into an agreement to purchase substantially all of the assets of Broadstripe LLC, a provider of residential and commercial bundled communications services. On January 14, WOW! completed the acquisition of Broadstripe's cable systems in Michigan.

As of April 2012, the combined customer total exceeded 800,000 after WOW! acquired Knology,[9] a broadband firm that operated in 13 markets. Knology had previously merged with Valley Telephone Company in 1999, Prairiewave Communications in 2007,[10] Graceba Total Communications in 2008,[11] and Sunflower Broadband in 2011.[12]

In June 2014, it sold its cable, Internet and phone systems in the South Dakota markets to Clarity Telecom. Part of the multimillion-dollar deal, worth $262 million, included the markets in Iowa and Minnesota previously served by Knology and PrairieWave Communications.[13] In 2015, these markets would officially become known as Vast Broadband.[14]

In September 2016, WOW! purchased NuLink, a cable company serving Newnan, Georgia with approximately 34,000 customers at the time the deal closed.[15] In October, it came to an agreement with Midco to sell its systems in Lawrence, Kansas; these systems currently pass approximately 67,000 homes and businesses in the area.[16]

After a 2017 initial public offering, the firm was publicly traded with Avista Capital Partners and Crestview Partners retaining significant stakes.[17] On June 28, WideOpenWest officially no longer serves the Lawrence, Kansas area.[18]

On March 6, 2018 WOW! announced that they had deployed DOCSIS 3.1 to 95% of their footprint, one of the first cable operators to reach that near-ubiquitous threshold.[19] As of August 6, 2019 Avista sold their shares in the firm, leaving Crestview WOW's largest shareholder holding a 37% stake in the company.[20]

On June 30, 2021 WOW! stated that it is selling its Cleveland and Columbus, Ohio, service areas to Atlantic Broadband (since renamed Breezeline) for $1.13 billion;[21] it closed the deal on September 1.[22] Also in June, WOW! announced the sale of its systems in Chicago, Evansville, and Anne Arundel, Maryland to Astound Broadband for $661 million.[21]

On May 15, 2023, WOW! has announced that it would discontinue its in-house TV services, including WOW! TV+ and migrating its video customers to YouTube TV across its footprint. WOW! will still maintain its current cable TV system while the said migration takes place. This move would free up bandwidth for the company's ISP overall.[23]

On December 31, 2025, DigitalBridge and Crestview announced that they had completed the take-private acquisition of WOW! for $1.5 billion.[24]

Internet availability by state

State Population Covered by WOW![25]
Michigan 1,872,510
Alabama 624,373
Illinois 1,604,922
South Carolina 260,525
Florida 804,094
Indiana 317,809
Georgia 474,460
Tennessee 139,600

Network availability by city

City Homes passed[26] Coaxial Miles Fiber Miles Total Network Miles
Detroit, MI 706,366 6,286 2,155 8,441
Chicago, IL 488,219 3,242 1,073 4,315
Pinellas, FL 297,635 3,441 586 4,027
Huntsville, AL 127,211 1,943 454 2,397
Baltimore, MD (Broadstripe) 110,806 1,226 427 1,653
Montgomery, AL 107,554 1,303 336 1,639
Evansville, IN 105,939 1,323 459 1,782
Augusta, GA 96,887 1,356 448 1,804
Charleston, SC 93,599 1,209 563 1,772
Lansing, MI 92,533 2,045 732 2,777
Columbus, GA 86,131 1,033 300 1,333
Panama City, FL 84,228 951 218 1,169
Knoxville, TN 54,597 764 317 1,081
Newnan, GA 43,440 838 352 1,190
Dothan, AL 33,184 547 214 761
West Point, GA 17,748 336 338 674
Auburn, AL 15,251 188 202 390

See also

References

  1. ^ a b "WideOpenWest, Inc. 2020 Annual Report (Form 10-K)" (PDF). ir.wowway.com. Wide Open West. December 2020.
  2. ^ a b "WideOpenWest, Inc. 2019 Annual Report (Form 10-K)" (PDF). ir.wowway.com. Wide Open West. March 2020.
  3. ^ "WOW! Internet Cable and Phone - Bundle offers and support". WowWay.com. Wide Open West. Retrieved 2016-08-20.
  4. ^ "WideOpenWest, Inc. - investor relations". ir.wowway.com. Retrieved 2023-01-27.
  5. ^ "WOW! REPORTS THIRD QUARTER 2022 RESULTS". WideOpenWest, Inc. November 3, 2022. Retrieved 2023-01-27.
  6. ^ "About WOW!". WowWay.com. Wide Open West. Retrieved 2016-08-31.
  7. ^ "Waller Advises Sale".
  8. ^ "SBC Sells For a Song". Multichannel News.
  9. ^ "WOW! to Acquire Knology for $19.75 Per Share in Cash". BusinessWire.com. 2012-04-18.
  10. ^ PrairieWave Change Causes E-mail Glitches
  11. ^ "Knology Announces Closing of $75 Million Graceba Acquisition". Reuters. January 4, 2008. Archived from the original on September 11, 2012.
  12. ^ Lawhorn, Chad (January 18, 2011). "Sunflower Broadband's new owners change name to Knology". Lawrence Journal-World. Retrieved 24 July 2013.
  13. ^ "WOW! sells off SD systems to Clarity for $262M". Retrieved 2015-09-24.
  14. ^ "Vast Broadband Launches In SD". 12 March 2015. Retrieved 2015-09-24.
  15. ^ "WOW! Closes Acquisition of NuLink to Provide High-Speed Internet, Cable TV and Phone Service to Metro Atlanta" (PDF). www.wowway.com. September 12, 2016. Retrieved December 17, 2016.
  16. ^ "Midco to Acquire WOW! System in Lawrence, KS" (PDF). www.wowway.com. October 21, 2016. Retrieved December 17, 2016.
  17. ^ "News" (PDF). wowway.com. WideOpenWest.
  18. ^ "MidCo". www.wowway.com. Archived from the original on 2017-11-09. Retrieved 2017-07-07.
  19. ^ "WOW! 1 Gig Internet Speeds Now Available to More Than 95 Percent of Customers" (PDF). WOW!. 2018-03-06. Retrieved 2018-06-19.
  20. ^ "10-K" (PDF). wowway.com. WideOpenWest.
  21. ^ a b "WideOpenWest sells 5 service areas for $1.8B". www.teletrader.com. Retrieved 2021-06-30.
  22. ^ Reading 9/1/2021, News Wire Feed Light. "Atlantic Broadband wraps buy of two WOW systems". Light Reading. Retrieved 2021-09-07.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  23. ^ A small cable company is going all in on YouTube TV for video - The Verge (published May 15, 2023)
  24. ^ "DigitalBridge and Crestview Partners Complete Take-Private Acquisition of WideOpenWest (WOW!)". Yahoo! Finance. Retrieved 2026-01-07.
  25. ^ "WOW! Availability by State". broadbandnow.com. Retrieved 2017-01-16.
  26. ^ "WideOpenWest, Inc. 2020 10-K" (PDF). ir.wowway.com. 2020-12-31. Retrieved 2021-06-01.
allikas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WideOpenWest