Cable One to Combine Fiber JV with Point Broadband, Acquire Vyve

Jan. 6, 2025 – Cable One is expanding its fiber holdings, combining its Clearwave joint venture with Point Broadband and acquiring another fiber provider itself.

The cable operator is an investor in both Clearwave and Point Broadband, having started the former with private equity firms in 2022. The combined company will have more than 500,000 fiber passings across 12 states, with plans to hit 1 million “in the near-term through a combination of organic builds and M&A,” according to the companies.

The combined company will be controlled by GTCR and Berkshire Partners, who already back Point Broadband, but Cable One will “remain a significant shareholder.” GTCR also helped form Clearwave.

“We're proud of what Clearwave Fiber has built, and are excited to remain a significant shareholder in the combined Company as it continues its fiber deployment strategy in small towns and underserved communities across the country,” Todd Koetje, Cable One’s CFO and interim CEO, said in a statement.

The deal is expected to close in the first half of 2026.

Cable One lost 21,200 broadband subscribers in the third quarter of 2025, well below expectations even amid a dour outlook for cable ISPs. The company had already been looking for a new CEO and announced last week that Jim Holanda would be taking the position by the end of March.

The cable company counts more than 1 million broadband subscribers across the west, midwest, and southern United States. Some of those are fiber subscribers, but the company doesn’t disclose the exact number.

Last year was rough for the cable industry generally, given lingering effects from the Affordable Connectivity Program shutting down and increased competition from fiber ISPs and fixed wireless services offered by the major mobile carriers. Analysts don’t expect the industry to return to subscriber growth anytime soon, but cable giants Comcast and Charter have made efforts to address consumer frustration around pricing and are pushing their mobile services in a bid to keep customers around longer through bundles.

Cable One began piloting a mobile service in November. The company also launched two cheaper tiers of broadband plans aimed at competing with fixed wireless and appealing to the most low-income households.

Cable One Acquiring MBI

Cable One also announced Monday it was acquiring Mega Broadband Investments, which sells fiber broadband service under the brand name Vyve Broadband and in which Cable One was already an investor. 

The company was actually forced to make the purchase. GTCR, one of the private equity companies that started Clearwave and Point Broadband, also owns most of MBI, and under a deal struck when Cable One bought its 45 percent stake, GTCR could exercise a put option requiring Cable One to buy the rest.

On Jan. 2 GTCR investors did so, according to the companies.

As of Sept. 30, MBI had about 675,000 passings and 210,000 fiber broadband customers. Cable One is expecting to pay between $475 million and $495 million and take on between $845 million and $895 million in MBI debt set to mature in November 2027. The companies expect to close the deal on Oct 1., 2026.

“Cable One intends to finance the purchase price for the transaction with a combination of cash resources and indebtedness, which may include borrowings under the Company’s existing $1.25 billion revolving credit facility or new debt instruments,” the company said in a release.

New WOW! CEO

The new owners of WideOpenWest (WOW!) announced Tuesday that Frank van der Post had been appointed CEO. He was previously president of Breezeline for five years.

Van der Post took over Tuesday from former WOW! CEO Teresa Elder, who retired after eight years at the helm of the cable operator.

The announcement comes less than a week after investment firms DigitalBridge Group and Crestview Partners closed their $1.5 billion acquisition of the company. Crestview, which was WOW!’s largest stockholder with about 37 percent of the company’s outstanding shares, rolled over its shares. 

“We welcome Frank van der Post to WOW! as we accelerate our growth plans,” Jonathan Friesel, DigitalBridge’s head of fiber, said in a statement. “Under Frank's experienced leadership, we look forward to investing in network and customer experience enhancements, pursuing operational excellence, and delivering an exceptional connected experience over WOW!'s high-performance networks.”

WOW! counted about 457,000 broadband subscribers at the end of the third quarter of 2025. That includes about 50,000 fiber subscribers from WOW!’s network expansion efforts.

The company had been aiming to pass 400,000 new homes with fiber in the coming years, and counted about 223,000 fiber passings at the end of the third quarter. 

DigitalBridge is a major investor in the telecom space and owns companies like Zayo, Vantage, and Vertical Bridge. The investment firm is itself being acquired by Japanese conglomerate Softbank in a $4 billion deal, which is expected to close in the first half of 2026.