Meredith Corp. signed a definitive agreement to buy the broadcast assets of TV stations in Phoenix and St. Louis from Gannett and Sander Media. Gannett also completed its acquisition of Belo. The agreement with Meredith stems from a Department of Justice consent decree, which required Gannett to divest a St. Louis station to get approval for its Belo acquisition (CD Dec 17 p6). The stations -- KTVK Phoenix, KASW Phoenix, and KMOV St. Louis -- will be sold for $407.5 million, Meredith said in a press release (http://bit.ly/1hzeX3R). “At the closing, Meredith will simultaneously convey KASW-TV to Sagamore Hill of Phoenix, LLC, which, through its affiliates, owns and operates two television stations in two markets,” Gannett said in a separate press release (http://ganne.tt/1c2USgP). The purchase of Belo “nearly doubles Gannett’s broadcast portfolio and creates the largest independent station group of major network affiliates in the top 25 markets,” it said (http://bit.ly/1cNF4zr).

Sixty-nine percent of respondents were concerned about computer and phone data collection by private companies and the federal government, according to a Washington Post poll published Sunday (http://wapo.st/1hw6QoC). The poll found 43 percent were “very concerned,” as opposed to the 26 percent “somewhat concerned.” Sixty-six percent were concerned about data collection by the National Security Agency (NSA), said the poll. In separate cases, 69 percent of respondents were concerned about personal data collection on websites such as Amazon, Google and eBay, and the same was true of information collected by phone companies such as AT&T and Verizon. Fifty-nine percent of respondents were concerned about data collection from retail stores such as Target, Walmart and CVS, said the poll. Thirty-four percent of respondents were more concerned about data privacy since the leaks by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, while 62 percent maintained that the leaks had made “no difference” in their estimation of data privacy, said the poll. Seventy-four percent of respondents said they have not taken any action to “better protect” data privacy in the wake of the Snowden leaks, said the poll. A random sample of 1,006 adults from across the country, which included landline and cellphone users, was polled from Nov. 14 to 17, said an adjoined article in the Post (http://wapo.st/JgXocs). The poll has a margin sampling error of 3.5 percentage points, it said.

The multiyear iPhone deal that Apple signed with China Mobile will also have “implications” for Sprint, Wells Fargo Senior Analyst Jennifer Fritzsche said Monday. The iPhone 5s and iPhone 5c will be available via China Mobile’s network of retail stores and at Apple retail stores across mainland China starting Jan. 17, Apple said Sunday in a news release. It’s “clearly a meaningful” announcement for Apple, said Fritzsche. China Mobile is the world’s largest mobile operator, with more than 760 million customers, making it seven times larger than Verizon, she said. China Mobile, like Sprint, is deploying the TDD LTE 4G service on the 2.5 GHz spectrum, she said. Until now, the iPhone hasn’t supported the 2.5 GHz band, she said. With the “significant scale” that China Mobile “brings to the table, it is our understanding that future versions of the iPhone device will now support this band,” she said. That’s a “significant positive” for Sprint shares, she said. Apple, however, didn’t immediately comment on its plans. Of the “Big 4” carriers, Sprint is the only one using the TDD version of LTE, she said. The iPhone “continues to be the most embraced high end” smartphone in the U.S., so having the device support the spectrum band and the TDD LTE technology “should strengthen Sprint’s competitive position in future quarters,” she said. Sprint shares, however, closed 1.8 percent lower Monday at $9.68.

Neustar added area code 854 for portions of South Carolina served by the existing 843 code, the North American Numbering Plan Administrator said in a news release Monday (http://bit.ly/1ienhsG). Neustar had forecast that numbers in the 843 area code would be exhausted by the end of 2015, it said.

Cable operator Cogeco’s Atlantic Broadband will launch TiVo-based mobile app and TV Everywhere services in early 2014 as it completes deployment of the Roamio DVRs across seven markets, Atlantic Chief Marketing Officer David Isenberg told us. Atlantic launched sales of Roamio in the Cumberland, Md., market in October and has since expanded it to Aiken, S.C., and Miami, and plans to add the Annapolis, Md., and Uniontown, Altoona/Johnstown and Warren/Bradford, Pa., areas by early next year, Isenberg said. The Roamio DVR marketed by Atlantic added a Multimedia over Coax (MoCA) connector and Atlantic is “in the final stages” of internal testing of both the TiVo-based mobile app and TV Everywhere offering, Isenberg said. Atlantic had 230,304 video customers Aug. 31, along with 177,108 customers for broadband and 78,246 for telephone, Cogeco said. Video subscribership was down 7,009 from a year earlier and the service had 44.5 percent penetration in Atlantic markets, Cogeco said. Cogeco bought onetime Charter Communications affiliate Atlantic for $1.3 billion in 2012. “We plan to knit together these services so that if you are a TiVo customer and TiVo knows what things you have set season passes for, the TV Everywhere platform will know that and serve you related content instantly,” Isenberg said. “It will lead to a much more personalized and consistent experience across platforms and will ultimately allow people to find the content they want to watch faster and easier.” The mobile app and TV Everywhere services will be offered free to subscribers to Atlantic’s existing TiVo bundles. Atlantic hasn’t disclosed how many TiVo customers it has. Isenberg said it has so far received a “great response” from new and existing customers. The Internet services, which were recently upgraded to 75/5 Mbps and 30/3 Mbps from 40/3 Mbps and 20/2 Mbps, have attracted many TiVo customers, Isenberg said. About 70 percent of Atlantic’s new subscribers choose the DOCSIS 3.0-based services, he said. Less than 50 percent of the total subscriber base get the DOCSIS 3.0 service, he said. While its parent Cogeco has deployed Rovi’s remote recording and XD tablet streaming services in Canada, Atlantic will retain TiVo in the U.S., Isenberg said. It also will continue to push TiVo with an install base that also includes Cisco and Arris’s Motorola Mobility set-tops, he said. Those customers subscribing solely for video will likely get Cisco or Motorola set-tops, Isenberg said. “What we market, sell and believe is the right platform to meet customer needs going forward is TiVo,” he said. “For us they are the only platform that offers the ability to stream live TV into the home and because they are cloud-based we can provide a multi-screen experience.” With TiVo readying both a cloud-based user interface and network DVR, an increasing number of functions will likely migrate to servers from a set-top, Isenberg said. The trend will start with “incremental storage and archiving and then over time I would expect to see more and more of the capabilities moving to a hosted platform,” Isenberg said.

The Senate Commerce Committee sent S.Res. 157 to the full Senate Thursday. The bill, which the committee cleared in late July, would express the sense of the Senate that phone service must be improved in rural areas and that no entity may unreasonably discriminate against users in those areas. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., who introduced S.Res. 157 with Sens. Deb Fischer, R-Neb., and Tim Johnson, D-S.D., has expressed concerns that call completion issues persist despite FCC action (CD July 31 p1).

The FCC Wireless Bureau asked for comments on a waiver request by ClearRF, which manufactures cell-signal boosters. The company asked for six to 10 months to sell boosters that don’t conform to rules that take effect March 1. Comments are due Jan. 14, replies Jan. 21, said a Monday public notice (http://bit.ly/18Ip0Ds). “ClearRF’s Dual-Band Cellular Signal Amplifiers allow you to receive improved cellular signal on your phone, air card, laptop, cellular router, or any cellular device, wherever you happen to need it; your vehicle, boat, desktop workspace, or RV,” according to the company’s website (clearrf.com).

The Free State Foundation questioned a report by Britain’s Office of Communications (Ofcom) that wireless subscribers there pay lower prices and get a better deal than consumers in the U.S. “The intense pressure on telecom companies in the UK and other countries in Europe to reduce consumer prices has caused those companies to lose revenue and delay investment in infrastructure and innovation,” wrote FSF Legal Fellow Sarah Leggin (http://bit.ly/1hzNq2f). “Moreover, the plans available for such low prices do not include the data capacity that the average wireless customer today demands. As such, the low prices offered by wireless companies in the UK are not a proper basis for assessing the differences in consumer welfare between the wireless marketplace in the U.S. and the wireless marketplace in the UK."

President Barack Obama during a Friday press conference flagged ConnectED as an initiative he likes. This update to the E-rate program, “where we're going to be initiating wireless capacity in every classroom in America, will make a huge difference,” Obama said, citing its effects on both classrooms and teachers. The White House announced this initiative in the summer. He also touched heavily on National Security Agency surveillance concerns. (See separate report above in this issue.)

Verizon has fewer than one million customers remaining on copper facilities in areas where Verizon fiber is available, the telco told aides to FCC Commissioners Mignon Clyburn and Jessica Rosenworcel Tuesday and Wednesday, an ex parte filing said (http://bit.ly/18DERmF). Verizon discussed its work to “facilitate IP VoIP interconnection through voluntary commercial agreements,” citing its agreement with Vonage to exchange voice traffic in IP format (see related story in this issue). Verizon’s agreement with Vonage is its “second voluntarily negotiated commercial IP interconnection agreement for VoIP,” and the telco expects other agreements will follow, it said.