Richardstown Cable is an American telecommunications and mass media company. It was formerly known as Warner Cable MBT from 1984 to 1990, and MBX Cable from 1990 to 2005.
History[]
In 1984, Warner Cable acquired Service Distribution Cable of Richardstown, North Carolina and became part of the Carolina cluster under the name Warner Cable MBT.
In 1990, Warner Communications merged with Time Inc. to form Time Warner, Warner Cable MBT was spun off from its then owners Time Warner Cable due to issues, and Warner Cable MBT was renamed MBX Cable, retaining the eye-ear symbol under license from Time Warner, which lasted until 1999, when MBX Cable formed a partnership with Dayton-Hudson Corporation to have MBX Cable exclusive to Target stores, and to remodel 12 old MBX Cable retail locations, which resulted in the logo being slightly modified. In 1998, however, Time Warner Cable returned to the area by acquiring Tele-Comm Services.
In 2005, as part of the new city's name, MBX Cable was renamed to its current name.
In 2008, Richardstown Cable went public on NASDAQ under the symbol RICAB. But in 2009, Richardstown Cable filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and was delisted from NASDAQ. Richardstown Cable later closed down 2 retail locations as a result, and sold the 2 closed locations to Time Warner Cable. In December 2009, it emerged from bankruptcy.
In 2010, it acquired a new corporate office at the Time Warner Offices in Richardstown, North Carolina.
In 2014, it introduced a new logo, and after that, it introduced Wireless Group d/b/a RTCable Wireless.
In 2019, Richardstown Cable formed a partnership with Best Buy to form independent store within a store places.
On July 7, 2019, it was reported that RTC Restructuring Group LLC, an affiliate of RTLS Capital division of RTLS, was seeking strategic alternatives for Richardstown Cable, which might include a possible sale to Charter Communications or a planned second initial public offering. On July 17, 2019, Brunswick-based ATMC Cable has announced to acquire the cable, broadband, and internet assets of Richardstown Cable. On July 19, 2019, if the deal is successful, Charter may acquire up to 200 subscribers of Richardstown Cable, and integrate the subscribers into the Spectrum cable service.
In October 2019, the merger between RTC and ATMC Cable was called off, but Spectrum agreed to acquire 180 subscribers from RTC. In November 2019, Richardstown Cable announced to merge with FITNE Cable, pending approval.
Carriage disputes[]
Carriage disputes began in 1999 shortly after partnering up with Target Stores, the disputes would usually be resolved in most cases, in some rare cases with sometimes channels drop due to expiring contract.
Here is the list of notable disputes
- In 1999, Paramount Stations Group and MBX Cable did not renew the owned and operated stations, that would have seen WPMT, WVIA, and WFXC, dropped. But in June 1999, the dispute was resolved.
- In October 1999, MBX Cable removed WGN's national feed channel from the guide after Tribune dropped The WB feed on the national WGN service, leading to a dispute. In 2008, WGN's national feed (now known as WGN America) was readded when FITNE downgraded WSRS-TV Superstation status to satellite and FITNE Cable only.
- In 2004, it refused to carry FSN channels due to a dispute with Fox Sports, but in 2005, FSN channels were added.
- Shortly after its bankruptcy, it immediately dropped its own 2 channels, YNN Richardstown and Information Press. When it emerged in December 2009, the 2 channels were restored.
- In 2014, Richardstown Cable was involved in a dispute with Viacom Media Networks, which would have seen all Viacom channels removed, but it was resolved in late 2014, but one channel BET Hip-Hop was dropped and was replaced by Revolt, a music-oriented channel founded by Sean Combs.
- In 2017, Sinclair Broadcast Group informed viewers about a potential blackout on 2 stations WGDE and WEDE. This was a result of a contract with Richardstown Cable was almost set to expire on July 3, 2017. But the dispute was resolved shortly after.
- In April 2019, after a month of completion of the acquisition of 21st Century Fox by The Walt Disney Company, Richardstown Cable went into a dispute with Disney after the carriage deal was almost set to expire on April 15, 2019, but it was resolved on April 7, 2019, but however, ESPN Classic was dropped due to the dispute and due to it becoming a video on demand only service. ESPN Classic was replaced by Sports Classic Archives.