Liberty Global got regulatory clearance from the European Commission for its public offer to shareholders of cable company Ziggo, Liberty said in a news release Friday (http://bit.ly/1sudnrJ). Liberty Global offered commitments to address the European Commission’s competition concerns, the release said. Those concessions included divestment of Liberty’s Film1 business in the Netherlands, minimum IP transit capacity and “behavioral commitments” connected to contracts with broadcasters, the release said. To comply with U.S. regulatory requirements, Liberty Global may reduce the minimum acceptance level condition of the offer to 65 percent of Ziggo’s “aggregate issued and outstanding ordinary share capital,” the release said. The deal “will benefit consumers and businesses across the Netherlands given our commitment to investment and innovation in the Dutch market,” said Liberty Global CEO Mike Fries in the release.

The FCC Media Bureau asked AT&T to provide responses, supporting documentation, and data on Internet speeds offered, network planning, subscriber behavior and other information, by Oct. 31. The information is needed for the FCC to complete its review of the transaction applications of Comcast and Time Warner Cable, the bureau said in a letter to AT&T (http://bit.ly/1yd6cYc). The FCC requires information and data from other commercial wireline carriers against which the applicants compete, it said. The information requested includes plan level subscriber data by ZIP Code for the period June 1, 2013, through June 30, 2014, and the company’s use of data caps, the bureau said (http://bit.ly/1CYRbsJ).

More than 99 percent of Comcast’s shareholders voted to support a proposed stock issuance in connection with the planned buy of Time Warner Cable, Comcast said in a news release Wednesday (http://bit.ly/1qj5xeF). Comcast will issue 2.875 shares of Comcast Class A common stock for every one share of Time Warner Cable common stock, the release said. TWC shareholders will vote on the merger Thursday, the release said.

Herring Networks urged the FCC to consider conditions on Comcast’s planned buy of Time Warner Cable, including requiring Comcast divest some national cable holdings. The FCC should take a “strong look” at the ownership and workings of iN Demand, the pay-per-view and VOD service owned by Comcast, Cox Communications and TWC, Herring said in an ex parte filing posted Wednesday in dockets 14-90 and 14-57 (http://bit.ly/1sdtrit). Comcast “should divest of its ownership interest in and management of iN Demand post-merger,” it said. The commission needs to consider Bright House Networks’ subscriber numbers in its calculations “should Bright House rely upon Comcast to negotiate its programming agreements post-merger,” Herring said. Consumers would benefit with more diverse programming offering if Comcast doesn’t negotiate programming affiliation agreements on behalf of Bright House, Spinco or Charter Communications, post-deal, it said. Herring also continued to urge the FCC to act swiftly and favorably on AT&T/DirecTV. Herring has had positive experiences and fair consideration “extended by the telco video providers when seeking distribution, including from AT&T U-verse,” it said. Herring’s forerunner battled over the owners of iN Demand over their lack of carriage of WealthTV.

Dish Network and Frontier Communications renewed a multiyear contract that gives the telco’s customers bundled technology solutions. The bundled offerings pair Frontier broadband and voice services with a suite of Dish products and services, said the DBS company in Tuesday in a news release (http://bit.ly/1saQmKi). It said Frontier is a single, local point of contact for service and billing.

Cox Communications said it will begin offering its “G1GABLAST” gigabit Internet service to its residential customers later this year. Cox will first offer the G1GABLAST service to customers in portions of the Phoenix metropolitan area, followed by offerings in Las Vegas and Omaha. The company said it plans to deploy the service nationwide by the end of 2016. “Cox will deliver the choice of gigabit speeds to all of our customers nationwide,” said President Pat Esser in a Monday news release. G1GABLAST will cost $69.99 per month for customers in Phoenix as part of a service bundle. Cox said it’s also doubling speeds for its High Speed Internet Preferred and High Speed Internet Premier services (http://bit.ly/Za4GGO).

Comcast’s incentive and ability to “foreclose competing Latino content providers” from being competitive will increase if its proposed deal to buy Time Warner Cable is approved, Entravision CEO Walter Ulloa and other Entravision executives told Philip Verveer, aide to FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, said an ex parte filing posted in docket 14-57 Friday (http://bit.ly/ZreoVV). Comcast is affiliated with Entravision’s competitor Telemundo, and the FCC should condition any approval of Comcast/TWC with “structural remedies” to “ensure that Comcast doesn’t produce content that competes with its unaffiliated programmers and does not become a dominant” multichannel video program distributor to the Latino market, it said.

Discovery Communications and Suddenlink renewed a long-term distribution agreement to deliver Discovery’s 13 U.S. networks to Suddenlink TV customers. Suddenlink customers will have continued access to the networks and VOD content, including OWN: Oprah Winfrey Network, TLC and Investigation Discovery, Discovery said Monday in a news release (http://bit.ly/1vHGd6x). The companies expect Suddenlink customers to have authenticated access to Discovery content inside and outside the home in the near future, Discovery said.

Any potential FCC action on the definition of what constitutes a multichannel video programming distributor would involve “a number of complex issues for the Commission to consider,” said Comcast Executive Vice President David Cohen in a meeting with Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel last week, according to an ex parte filing posted in docket 14-57 Friday (http://bit.ly/ZreoVV). The Media Bureau recently reopened a proceeding on the issue to ex parte filings, and Chairman Tom Wheeler said the matter was something the FCC may be considering (CD Oct 1 p8). Defining online video providers “as MVPDs would confer obligations as well as benefits on these entities,” Cohen said.

There’s no national broadband market, said Comcast Executive Vice President David Cohen in a meeting Tuesday with Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel and aide Clint Odom, according to an ex parte filing posted in docket 14-57 Friday (http://bit.ly/ZBYXdY). Any assessment of whether Comcast’s proposed buy of Time Warner Cable hurts competition in broadband should examine the market at the local level, the filing said. Comcast and TWC serve distinct geographic areas, Cohen said. Critics arguing that Comcast would control too much of the broadband market after the deal are unfairly not including DSL and wireless broadband or using too high a speed threshold for defining broadband, Cohen said. “DSL and wireless do meet some consumers’ broadband needs for some uses, even if these technologies are not yet perfect substitutes for all consumers.” At a 10 Mbps broadband threshold, Comcast would control 40 percent of fixed connections after the transaction, while at a 25 Mbps threshold, that number increases by less than 1 percent, Cohen said.