Charter Wants to Create Skinny Pay-TV Bundles

Deadline: “Some of the content companies would suffer dramatically” if they’re left out, Charter CEO Tom Rutledge told analysts. But his company and other pay-TV providers must figure out how to reduce the number of channels customers have to take, and the price they pay, because “on the edges people are not buying that full [pay TV] package because they can’t afford it.” That’s what Charter is doing as it prepares to become the No. 2 cable operator with its pending acquisitions of Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks. It wants to create “a new video product” with “high quality video offerings but at a lower retail price.”