经济学人下载:有线电视 耗资610亿的提案

Business
商业报道

Cable television
有线电视

The 61 billion proposal
耗资610亿的提案

The latest plot twists in a continuing television drama
电视连续剧中最新的情节突转

SPURNED suitors usually nurse the wounds of rejection quietly.
令人唾弃的起诉者通常悄然的治愈拒绝的伤口。

Not in the cable-television industry. Having unsuccessfully approached Time Warner Cable twice last year, Charter Communications, a rival American cable operator, has gone public with a new proposal.
这并不是在电缆电视行业。美国有线电视运营商的竞争对手Charter通讯，两次试图接近时代华纳有线公司都未能成功，现在又有一个新的提案已经上市。

On January 14th Charter announced a bid valuing TWC at 61 billion including debt, offering 132.50 ashare compared with the 95 or so they were fetching early last June, when rumours of its approach emerged.
1月14日charter宣布为时代华纳有限公司估价610亿，提供一个份额132.50美元相比于原来的95美元高出许多。早在去年六月这些做法就流传出来了。

Charter's boss, Tom Rutledge, wrote a public letter to Robert Marcus, the boss of TWC, beseeching him to consider the offer, and held a conference call to seek shareholders' backing for the bid.
Charter的老板汤姆?拉特里奇写了一封公开信给TWC的老板罗伯特马库斯，求他考虑该提案，并举行了电话会议，以寻求股东的支持。

TWC's executives are playing hard to get: they want a higher price, and vow not to let Charter steal the company.
TWC的高管们欲擒故纵，他们希望得到更高的价格，并发誓决不让charter公司窃取。

For those who have been following this cable drama, it has been a question of when, not if, the industry would consolidate.
对于那些一直在遵循这种电缆剧的人来说，一直有个有关行业巩固的时间问题，而不是是否的问题。

TWC isAmerica's second-largest cable operator by subscribers, after Comcast, and Charter is the fourth-largest.
TWC是继康卡斯特后的美国第二大有线电视运营商，而charter排名第四位。

John Malone, one of the industry's pioneers, whose company, Liberty Media, is Charter's biggest shareholder, is among many in the business calling for mergers.
行业的先驱之一—约翰马龙，他的公司自有媒体是行业最大的股东，也是众多的业务中要求兼并的公司之一。

This would help cable firms fend off competition from satellite operators, phone companies and streaming services like Netflix, which are poaching their customers for internet service and for films and TV shows.
这将帮助有线电视公司抵御来自卫星运营商，电话公司和如Netflix的流媒体服务等互联网服务对他们客户的偷猎和对电视电影节目的竞争。

Besides letting them cut costs—Charter reckons a merger with TWC could save at least 500ma year—scale would also give cable operators more clout when negotiating with content providers over the rates they have to pay to carry their channels.
除了让他们削减成本，charter打算与TWC合并每年可以节省至少5亿，而且在于提供商洽谈必须支付的渠道费率时也使有线运营商更有底气。

Last year TWC got into a fight with CBS over its fees, which led to a blackout of CBS channels for a month until the two reached agreement.
去年TWC与CBS战斗而花费了过多的费用，这导致CBS频道停摆了一个多月，直到两方协议达成。

TWC lost more than 300,000 customers during the third quarter, many of them as a result of this spat.
TWC在第三季度失去了超过30万客户，其中不乏是因为这种争吵而出现的结果。

With its latest proposal judged still inadequate, Charter will have to decide whether to offer more.
其最新的提案也有不足之处，charter将不得不决定是否要提供更多。

Other cable firms, such as Comcast, may enter the fray, offering to buy all or part of TWC.
其他的有线电视公司，如comcast公司，可能会加入战斗，提供购买TWC所需的全部或部分资金。

Pay-television is not a growth business for cable operators, so they must become more creative to increase sales.
付费电视并不是有线电视运营商增长业务的方式，所以他们想要增加销售必须变得更有创意。

One area of experimentation is to offer broadband along with a light television package, as several cable providers are doing in certain markets, to appeal to wallet-wise youngsters.
实验的一个方面是提供宽带伴随着光的电视包装，几个有线运营商正在做某些市场，以吸引钱包鼓鼓的青少年。

Others are selling metered broadband, with the cost tied to usage.
其他正在销售的计量宽带，花费和使用成本紧紧相连。

Cable firms and other internet providers may soon be free to try even more radical experiments with pricing.
有线电视公司和其他互联网服务供应商们可能很快可以尝试更为激进的实验与定价。

On January 14th an appeals court struck down federal rules that required them to treat all internet traffic equally—a policy called net neutrality.
1月14日上诉法院推翻了一个名为网络中立的联邦规则，这个政策要求他们对待所有互联网流量相等。

If the court's ruling prevails, this would let cable firms and other internet providers start demanding payment from bandwidth-hungry suppliers of video, such as Netflix, for speedy delivery to viewers.
如果以法院的判决为准，这将让有线电视公司和其他互联网服务供应商开始要求高宽带视频用户，如Netflix快速传达给观众。

Besides giving cable firms a juicy new source of income, this could curb the expansion of an increasingly powerful group of competitors for providing packages of video content.
除了给电缆公司提供收入的新来源，这可能遏制日益强大的集团竞争对手扩张提供视频内容。

The cable firms could also favour video sites in which they had an interest: for example, Comcast part-owns Hulu, a rival to Netflix.
电缆公司也可能对视频网站感兴趣，例如，Netflix的竞争对手hulu—他们有用comcast的部分股权。

As any fan knows, cable-TV dramas tend to be long-running and full of plot twists.
由于任何人都知道，电缆电视剧往往是长时间运行而又情节曲折，

This one will probably be no different. Stay tuned.
这其中可能会没什么不同。敬请关注。