CenturyLink, the fourth-largest U.S. telco, began marketing
DirecTV service to customers in its 33-state footprint on Aug. 1 after an
agreement with Dish Network expired at the end of July.
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
CenturyLink last year
acquired Embarq, the former local telephone operations of Sprint. The Monroe,
La.-based telco, formerly known as CenturyTel, has about 7 million access
lines, 2.3 million broadband customers and 587,000 customers who subscribe to
Dish service.
DirecTV already had similar agreements with the three largest telcos --
AT&T, Verizon Communications and Qwest Communications -- which give it
coverage of approximately 90 million homes in the U.S. As of February 2009, AT&T
switched from offering Dish service to DirecTV in areas where U-verse TV is
unavailable.
