WASHINGTON, D.C. - The U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation held a full committee hearing today on Consumers, Competition, and Consolidation in the Video and Broadband Market.

Witness List:

Panel I

The Honorable Julius Genachowski, Chairman, Federal Communications Commission

The Honorable Christine Varney, Assistant Attorney General for Antitrust, U.S. Department of Justice

Panel II

Mr. Brian L. Roberts, Chairman and CEO, Comcast Corporation

Mr. John Wells, President, Writers Guild of America, West

Dr. Mark Cooper, Director of Research, Consumer Federation of America

Ms. Colleen Abdoulah, President and CEO, WOW! Internet, Cable, and Phone

Mr. Christopher S. Yoo, Professor of Law and Communication, University of Pennsylvania Law School, Philadelphia, PA

Key Quotations from Today’s Hearing:

“These are services that are vital to our democracy. They shape the way we communicate. They shape the way we share news and information. They shape the way we entertain ourselves and the way we spend our free time. When consolidation occurs in these markets, we need to pay attention. When companies swell to include both content and distribution, we need to pay attention. Because it is vitally important that when we have mergers in these markets, consumers cannot be left with lesser programming and higher rates.”

Chairman John D. (Jay) Rockefeller IV

“Robust and healthy competition is essential to producing consumer benefits – better services, and lower prices. An important part of our responsibility at the Commission is to ensure that communications industry transactions do not enable firms to frustrate innovation or raise prices ultimately paid by consumers. We must ensure that American consumers continue to enjoy all the benefits of competition and choice, in a vibrant and diverse communications and media environment that upholds vital First Amendment values.”

The Honorable Julius Genachowski, Chairman, Federal Communications Commission

“Antitrust enforcement helps keep markets competitive, protecting consumers and spurring innovation. In the merger context, this approach means ensuring that we either go to court to block those mergers that will substantially reduce competition or negotiate a settlement agreement that simultaneously enables the procompetitive aspects of a deal to go forward yet also prevents mergers from having anticompetitive effects on consumers.”

The Honorable Christine Varney, Assistant Attorney General for Antitrust, U.S. Department of Justice

“The new NBCU will advance key communications policy goals of Congress: diversity, localism, innovation, and competition. With Comcast’s demonstrated commitment to investment and innovation in communications, entertainment, and information, the new NBCU will be able to increase the quantity, quality, diversity, and local focus of its content, and accelerate the arrival of the multiplatform, ‘anytime, anywhere’ future of video programming that Americans want.”

Mr. Brian L. Roberts, Chairman and CEO, Comcast Corporation 

“The WGAW is extremely concerned about the impact the proposed merger of NBC Universal and Comcast will have on WGA content creators, entertainment industry workers and U.S. consumers. Over the past several decades, our industry has consolidated from literally dozens of independent entrepreneurs and suppliers, including many writer-owners making innovative and ground-breaking programming, to a handful of large media conglomerates most often controlling content from start to finish.”

Mr. John Wells, President, Writers Guild of America, West

“Allowing the largest cable operator in history to acquire one of the nation’s premier video content producers will radically alter the structure of the video marketplace and result in higher prices and fewer choices for consumers. The merging parties are already among the dominant players in the current video market. This merger will give them the incentive and ability to not only preserve and exploit the worst aspects of the current market, but to extend them to the future market.”

Dr. Mark Cooper, Director of Research, Consumer Federation of America

“In the post-combination world Comcast will have sufficient additional market power that it can create its own economic reality and make one plus one equal five. This makes all distributors in the United States quake as they will be forced to pay more for the content so essential to their businesses. Further, it means that American consumers will pay more as well. This is the antithesis of a pro-competitive deal.”

Ms. Colleen Abdoulah, President and CEO, WOW! Internet, Cable, and Phone

“At this point, then, the question is not if NBC Universal will be sold, but rather to whom. In a perfect world, General Electric would sell NBC Universal to a merging party that would not increase horizontal concentration in any market and for whom the merger would not create any violations of FCC rules.”

Mr. Christopher S. Yoo, Professor of Law and Communication, University of Pennsylvania Law School, Philadelphia, PA

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