Commentary: It's curtains for Long Island-based Cablevision's Voom

Long Island Business News, Dec 19, 2008 by Henry E Powderly II

Cablevision has decided to shut down its Voom lineup of high definition television stations.

But while the news may be sad for fans of channels like Monsters HD, Kung Fu HD and Paper Mache HD (fine, we made that one up), shuttering the division will put another troop of locals out of work.

Cablevision did say it plans to replace the channels in late January, when it turns off the Voom stations.

From the Multichannel News story:

In a memo to employees Thursday, Rainbow president and CEO Joshua Sapan blamed the suit and the scenario with Dish Network for leading to the demise of Voom HD domestically. The Voom HD operation, which includes two networks, will keep its international business running where it reaches 32 million subscribers in 36 countries.

"As you may have heard, Rainbow has made the difficult and painful decision to shut down the domestic operations of Voom, which regrettably will result in layoffs," Sapan said in the memo. "Voom's domestic business was made possible through an affiliation agreement between Rainbow and EchoStar, which was established in 2005."

"Unfortunately, earlier this year, a significant legal dispute arose with EchoStar (now known as Dish Network)," he added. "While that lawsuit is progressing, the expectation is that it will be at least a year before any sort of resolution is reached. Therefore, we have been evaluating different strategies and plans for Voom's domestic business."

Said Sapan, "Unfortunately, as we analyzed the opportunities and challenges in the current environment and the lawsuit, it became clear that we can no longer operate Voom domestically, particularly without EchoStar fulfilling its obligations and providing its support. Some Voom staff will remain at Rainbow to manage the operation of Voom internationally, using our expertise in content development and the depth of our HD programming library to seek new distribution opportunities around the world."

A Rainbow spokesperson confirmed that Voom's domestic operation was being closed, but declined to comment further, or discuss how many employees will lose their jobs. But those staffers reportedly won't have to leave for 60 days.