It's official: About five days after receiving federal regulatory approval, AT&T Broadband and Comcast Corp. said they closed their $54 billion merger late Monday.
In a press release, AT&T Corp. said it had completed the spinoff of AT&T Broadband to its shareholders. Immediately following the spinoff, the company said, it completed the combination with Comcast, creating a cable powerhouse with 21.4 million subscribers (27 million if AT&T's partnership interests in several other MSOs are counted).
The combined company will have 59,000 employees, a presence in 41 states, 6.3 million digital-video customers, 3.3 million high-speed-data customers and 1.3 million cable-telephony customers.
Also as part of the closing, AT&T chairman C. Michael Armstrong resigned that position with AT&T to become chairman of the combined company, which will be called Comcast Corp. Brian Roberts will remain president of Comcast.
"Once again, AT&T Broadband is positioned to accelerate the development and transformation of our industry," Armstrong said in a prepared statement. "AT&T Broadband and Comcast can accomplish more together than we could alone. Comcast will create value for its customers, shareowners and employees by bringing more services to more people more quickly."
AT&T shareholders received 0.3235 shares of Comcast Corp. class-A common stock for each share of AT&T they owned at market close Nov. 15 -- the record date.
Following the merger, AT&T shareowners will own a 56 percent economic stake and about a 66 percent voting interest in the new company. The Roberts family, which owns Comcast class-B shares, will control one-third of the new company's outstanding voting interest.
Comcast has assumed more than $24 billion in debt from AT&T and its subsidiaries, as well as $5 billion of AT&T subsidiary trust convertible preferred securities held by Microsoft Corp., which will be converted into 115 million shares of Comcast.
