Cable giant Charter Communications is laying off 1,200 employees nationwide as the company faces increased competition for its broadband internet packages.

The company operates Spectrum cable TV and broadband service, which was once a huge growth engine. But the company has faced a steady drumbeat of subscriber losses, including shedding 177,000 internet customers in the first and second quarters of this year.

The company has nearly 30 million internet customers.

The layoffs, equivalent to a little more than1% of its workforce, hit corporate and management positions at Charter’s headquarters in Stamford, Conn., and centers in Charlotte, Denver and St. Louis, according to a person familiar with the cuts but was not authorized to comment.

No sales or service positions were eliminated, the person said, adding the cuts were part of an effort to streamline management functions. The company is scheduled to announce its third-quarter earnings next week.

In addition to its internet service, Charter provides bundles of cable television channels to 12.6 million customers.

It also has nearly 11 million mobile phone subscribers.

The move comes in advance of Charter’s planned takeover of Cox Communications, which also operates in Southern California. This week’s cuts were not related to the Cox transaction, the knowledgeable person said.

Charter’s $34.5-billion industry-consolidating deal with Cox, which was unveiled in May, needs regulatory approval but that process has been slowed by the federal government shut-down.

Charter reported that it had about 94,500 active full-time workers at the end of 2024.

The company’s stock is down 27% since the beginning of the year. On Wednesday, shares slipped around 1% in mid-day trading.

Broadband internet has been the company’s bright spot as revenue from cable TV packages steadily declined over the years amid consumer cord-cutting and the shift to streaming.

Charter recognized that trend and began offering streaming apps to its broadband customers to help with retention efforts.

Two years ago, the company suffered huge cable TV customer losses during its 10-day blackout of Walt Disney Co. channels, including ESPN, during a tense distribution battle.

Charter was able to wrangle the ability to offer Disney’s streaming apps, including Disney+ and Hulu, to Spectrum customers.

The company had already been undergoing scattered instances of belt-tightening.

In August, Charter canceled its award-winning El Segundo based news show, “LA Times Today,” a collaboration with the Los Angeles Times, which ran on the cable company’s Spectrum 1 news channel.

Hollywood’s obsession with splashy team-ups may soon find its expression in one of the biggest deals of the year.

Warner Bros. Discovery, the media behemoth that owns DC Comics, “The Sopranos” and Scooby-Doo, has received acquisition interest from multiple companies, including Paramount, the company behind “Star Trek” and “Top Gun.”

Warner Bros. Discovery acknowledged those discussions on Tuesday without naming specific suitors, reminding investors that it is still pursuing a spin-off off its studio business.

If a deal with Paramount reaches fruition, it would create a news and entertainment behemoth to rival streaming juggernauts like Netflix and Disney. Here’s a look at the films, shows and characters that the combined company would own, from Harry Potter to Captain Kirk.

CNN and CBS News, two of the most recognizable brands in journalism, would be a powerful combination. It could also result in significant cost-cutting for the combined company because of the overlap in newsgathering and production costs.

CBS News, the venerable network that was home to Walter Cronkite and Edward R. Murrow, recently brought on board Bari Weiss, an opinion journalist who founded The Free Press, as its editor in chief. It’s unclear whether she would have oversight over CNN, the globe-spanning news colossus known for its blanket coverage of international affairs and breaking news, if the two companies merged.

While traditional cable networks are enormously profitable — generating hundreds of millions of dollars in cash — they are losing viewers and relevance every quarter. Some companies, like Comcast and Warner Bros., have been responding to that decline by spinning off their traditional TV businesses.

Not Paramount. The company behind “South Park” and “Yellowstone” is holding on to those channels, betting that those franchises will be popular with millions of viewers on both traditional TV and streaming. Acquiring a lineup of popular new channels would allow Paramount to shore up its leverage in negotiations with cable companies like Charter, which pay to distribute its programs. Both companies also rent rights to live sports, one of the last must-see programs in the imploding cable universe.

Prestige television is a linchpin for streaming companies, which rely on quality shows to entice new subscribers and keep existing customers happy. While HBO and Showtime are still reliable sources of traditional TV profits, both services are increasingly viewed as a supplier for their digital counterparts, HBO Max and Paramount+.

Around 2,000 Waymo vehicles are under investigation following reports of one of the self-driving taxis navigating around a school bus while children disembarked.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration opened a preliminary investigation on Oct. 17 to examine the performance of Waymo’s autonomous technology around stopped school buses and how the system is designed to comply with school bus traffic safety laws, according to the investigation filing.

The incident occurred on Sept. 22 in Atlanta, Georgia, when a Waymo using the Mountain View, Calif. company’s fifth generation automated driving system approached the right side of a stopped school bus. The vehicle initially stopped, but then drove around the front of the bus and past the left side, the filing said.

The vehicle ignored the bus’s extended stop arm on the left side and its traffic crossing control arm on the right side, near where students were unloading. The bus was also flashing a red light. Prior similar incidents have likely occurred, NHTSA said.

“Safety is our top priority, as we provide hundreds of thousands of fully autonomous paid trips every week in some of the most challenging driving environments,” a Waymo spokesperson said. “NHTSA plays a vital role in road safety, and we will continue to work collaboratively with the agency as part of our mission to be the world’s most trusted driver.”

Waymo has already made software updates to improve its self-driving performance, and has plans for additional updates, the spokesperson said. The school bus was partially blocking a driveway that the Waymo was exiting from during the incident, the company said, and the vehicle kept a safe distance from children.

According to Waymo, the driverless taxis are improving road safety conditions in the communities they operate in, achieving a fivefold reduction in injury-related crashes compared to human drivers. The company’s operations have seen glitches and recalls, however.

Last month, police officers in San Bruno, CA, observed a self-driving Waymo make an illegal U-turn at a traffic light. Officers could not issue a ticket because there was no human driver present, the San Bruno Police Department said. Instead, the department contacted the company to let them know about the violation.

When self-driving cars violate the rules of the road, law enforcement can’t penalize them the same way that they can humans. The way state law has been interpreted, traffic tickets can be issued only to an actual driver.

California lawmakers have sought to close the enforcement loophole with legislation that will take effect in July, but critics say the law isn’t strong enough.

Waymo spokesperson Julia Ilina said that the company’s vehicles are already subject to close, ongoing oversight by California regulators, and that the company’s autonomous driving system “is designed to respect the rules of the road.”

Waymo, which has offered rides in Los Angeles since November, expanded its service area in the city and in San Francisco this summer.