Startup cable TV operator Layer3 TV has signed a marketing deal with Colorado utility Longmont Power & Communications to bundle its TV product with the utility operator’s NextLight fiber-based broadband and phone service.
According to a Layer3 promotional page, the Denver-based cable company is offering its Platinum video bundle of more than 200 HD channels, plus a 4K-capable DVR and a $100 gift card, to NextLight customers for $74 a month. (The regular price for that Layer3 video package is $99 a month.) These NextLight users, who already get uncapped 1 Gbps internet service and digital voice, also receive three months free HBO.
RELATED: Layer3 says it has 13M passings, now No. 4 operator in U.S.
"NextLight provides high-speed broadband service and digital voice telephone service," Longmont Power spokesman Scott Rochat told local Longmont, Colorado, paper The Daily Camera. "We've heard from customer that want a different option on their television service. They can create a virtual bundle.”
Layer3 TV CEO Jeff Binder, meanwhile, told Multichannel News that the company is interested in establishing additional “synthetic bundles.”
Layer3 TV is seeking to carve out a counterintuitive niche in the pay-TV business, delivering robust programming bundles, technology and customer service acumen at a time when many cord-cutting-focused operators are trimming back their offerings.
The Layer3 service has been deployed in the Chicago and Washington, D.C., metropolitan areas, and Layer3 has said it will soon roll out in its home base of Denver. Pre-launch tests have also been conducted in Boston and Houston.
Last week, Binder tweeted that Layer3 is now the fourth biggest U.S. cable operator in the U.S. with more than 13 million passings. (Layer3 hasn’t released any subscriber metrics yet.)
The Chicago DMA includes around 3.5 million passings. Washington, D.C. has around 2.5 million.