More Comcast/NBCU Coverage
Comcast says its proposed deal will result in $290
million worth of consumer benefits, not the $2.4 billion cost to consumers
alleged in a study proffered by the American Cable Association.
That came in Comcast's response Monday at the FCC
to the ACA study by former FCC economist William Rogerson.
Calling the Rogerson study misleading,
Comcast said its own researchers, Mark Israel and Michael Katz, demonstrated
the $290 million savings and that Rogerson analysis "should be given
no weight."
They argue that Rogerson understates the
deal's cost savings, ignores data and provides no basis for the
conditions ACA is proposing on the deal.
Israel and Katz say that Rogerson provides no
credible evidence of any horizontal competitive harms, that the pricing models
he uses are unsubstantiated, that some of his cost-savings claims are
"false and misleading," and that even using Rogerson's methods
of computing net consumer benefit, the result would be $290 million in the plus
column.
Comcast's filing was just the latest volley in
what has been a series of papers from both sides filed at the FCC and taking
aim at their respective calculations of merger impacts.
Responding to Comcast's response to its
study, ACA President Matthew Polka said Tuesday in a statement:
"After almost a year of first producing and then revising its economic
arguments to justify government approval of this transaction, Comcast is
surprising no one by again revising its arguments for why this deal is not
harmful to the American consumer."
The FCC and Justice are widely believed to be winding down their review
of the deal.
