Comcast held a grand opening for its Studio Xfinity store in Chicago Friday. The new 9,000-square-foot space in Chicago’s Clybourn Corridor “brings together the best TV and Internet technology” and will be a testbed for “enhanced ways to serve customers,” said the company. The interactive space will allow customers to experience Comcast Internet, video, voice and home security and automation offerings, said Comcast. The “transformational retail environment” is part of a larger nationwide Comcast effort “to redefine the customer experience," said John Crowley, senior vice president-Comcast’s Greater Chicago Region. When customers enter the studio, store staff will greet and guide them throughout their visit, then provide support after they leave for any follow-up questions, said Crowley. Customers will be able to try out products and services at “demonstration towers,” while merchandise walls will show compatible third-party products including the Sonos Soundbar and Netgear routers “that complement the Xfinity lineup,” the company said. The store will hold informational events and activities, including workshops, product demos, sports-related events and game nights with coffee, tea and “refreshments,” said Comcast.

The Justice Department "believes that bigger is badder," which could spell big regulatory hurdles for Charter Communications buying Bright House Networks and Time Warner Cable, BTIG Research analyst Richard Greenfield said Friday in a blog. Pointing to comments by Nancy Rose, Antitrust Division deputy assistant attorney general for economic analysis, at a June American Bar Association event, Greenfield said it was "very difficult to see how the government can approve the creation of a company nearly the size of Comcast ... particularly as it is far from clear what concessions would alleviate the government’s underlying concerns without true competition materializing." The Justice Department apparently isn't looking at end users as it analyzes the video and broadband markets, and thus the agency rejects the idea that cable consolidation does not affect competition since cable operators are in different geographic markets with no overlapping customers, Greenfield wrote. Instead, the Justice Department seemingly sees the content distribution markets as national, and sees the growing size and scale of multichannel video programming distributors and Internet service providers creating difficulty for new broadband overbuilders to buy affordable programming, which in turn slows their buildouts, he said. Greenfield has said before that he believes the Charter/BHN/TWC deals face steep hurdles for regulatory approval (see 1506170033).

The FCC Media Bureau set an Aug. 10 deadline for comments in its next round of possible rule changes under the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act, it said in a public notice released Friday in docket 12-107. The agency is seeking input on means of making emergency information audibly accessible to the blind or visually impaired, such as prioritizing audio emergency information on a secondary audio stream, continuing to require school closing information to be included on that secondary audio stream, and requiring multichannel video programming distributors to ensure subscribers have access to a user-friendly mechanism for accessing audible emergency information on that secondary audio stream. The FCC already has rules requiring that MVPDs use a secondary audio stream to bring audible emergency information to consumers accessing linear programming on mobile devices and that manufacturers make such secondary audio streams easily accessible. Replies have a Sept. 8 submission deadline.

Charter Communications subsidiary CCO Safari II plans to sell six sets of senior secured notes to help pay for the $89.1 billion acquisitions of Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks, Charter said Thursday. The notes will mature in 2020, 2022, 2025, 2035, 2045 and 2055.

Comcast's Xfinity Voice Unlimited home phone service expanded to China, Hong Kong, India, Mexico, Singapore and South Korea, the company said Thursday. Through Xfinity Voice, users can make unlimited international calls to those nations and to American Samoa, Canada, Guam, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, as well as nationwide in the U.S. Comcast is rolling out the expanded Xfinity Voice Unlimited offering in its various markets through the end of August.

Charter Communications and Time Warner Cable asked the New York Public Service Commission and the California Public Utilities Commission to accept a transfer of indirect ultimate control of TWC to Charter, said documents filed with the New York and California commissions. The transaction doesn't involve a transfer of customers or any changes in regulated rates, terms or conditions of service, and the petition doesn't seek authority to change customers' regulated rates or terms, the New York filing said. The transaction will provide improved voice and other nonjurisdictional services at better values, and offer more competition for enterprise customers, said the California filing. Charter said the transaction won't be harmful or reduce competition in the state.

The residential broadband customer overlap between Charter Communications, Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks is practically nil, Charter said in a filing posted Monday in docket 15-149. Charter, BHN and TWC provide residential broadband service in more than 1.3 million census blocks nationwide, and the number of census blocks where any two of the three overlap by both having customers is 617, the three said. Thus, of roughly 18.4 million residential customers nationwide, 19,680 potentially could be served by two or more of the three companies, they said. "And even this nominal level of potential overlap likely overstates the extent of any actual overlap," since it's likely that different cable systems operate in different parts of those overlapping census blocks, they said.

Time Warner Cable shareholders rejected a shareholder proposal that would have had the company annually compile a report on what it spends directly and indirectly on lobbying and its membership in any nonprofit group involved in lobbying. The proposal, brought by Boston's Walden Asset Management, received about 61.2 million votes for and 160.5 million votes against at Wednesday's annual shareholder meeting, TWC said Monday. The TWC board recommended voting against the proposal, saying much of that information already is publicly available and it doesn't spend corporate money on Super PACs or ballot initiatives.

Trading began Thursday on Nasdaq and over the counter of Liberty Global's new tracking stock for its Caribbean and Latin American operations, the LiLAC Group. The company said in a news release Wednesday that the LiLAC Group stock was created to allow shareholders to invest directly in its cable business in Chile and its majority interest in a Puerto Rican cable company, Liberty Cablevision, which it and Searchlight Capital Partners bought in June.

Online video services run by cable operators shouldn't labor under the same regulations cable businesses do, Cablevision said in an ex parte filing posted Thursday in docket 14-261. Cablevision representatives met with FCC representatives about the agency's proposed re-interpretation of the definition of a multichannel video programming distributor to include some types of online video delivery. If the FCC does that, Cablevision said, "it should ensure that potential competitors in the online video marketplace are able to enter the market and compete on fair terms." Cablevision also asked for clarification of broadcasters' responsibilities to negotiate retransmission consent in good faith, referring to ongoing open proceedings on good-faith negotiations in docket 10-71. Meeting attendees included Cablevision lawyers and executives and front-office and other Media Bureau officials.