Altice USA will open an 80,000-square-foot office in Plano, Texas, and staff it with about 400 workers.
"Texas has been an important state for our legacy Suddenlink business and remains an important market for Altice USA both in terms of customers and employment," Altice spokeswoman Lisa Anselmo told FierceCable. "In fact, we already have a presence in Plano and expect to transition to the new offices at Granite Park V in the 3rd quarter of 2017. We also have other offices across Texas including in Tyler and Lubbock."
Anselmo said Altice plans to move into the new facility in the third quarter. Jobs at the facility include payroll, IT and other operational tasks, she added. Plano is in the footprint acquired by Altice NV when it purchased a controlling stake in Suddenlink Communications in 2015
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According to the Dallas Morning News report, Altice will spend about $5 million to outfit the facility, with the city of Plano offering up around $210,000 in economic incentives.
Bringing in 400 jobs in a Trump-leaning state like Texas isn’t a bad look for the French telecom conglomerate, which had been expected to take a hatchet to many of the jobs in its acquired Suddenlink and Cablevision service areas.
"Texas is a very important market for us," Anselmo told the Morning News. "We've expanded our broadband service and announced a five-year plan to upgrade our fiber network in Texas."
Altice USA is currently looking to raise cash for further expansion and has executed on a plan to conduct an initial public offering.
In a filing with the Securities Exchange Commission delivered last month, the European telecom conglomerate’s U.S. cable-operator arm said it plans to raise $100 million. However, the actual monetary goal is probably higher—Altice said the $100 million figure was “estimated solely for the purpose of calculating the amount of the registration fee.”
The company said it’s still determining the number of shares it will offer and the price range for the IPO. Reuters said the company could be looking to raise as much as $2 billion.
Altice is set to report first-quarter earnings on Thursday.