US West To Pay $1.2 Billion For Atlanta Cable-TV Systems

ENGLEWOOD, Colo.- US West Inc., further expanding its interests in cable television, said it plans to buy two Atlanta cable-television systems for $1.2 billion.

The acquisition comes 14 months after the Englewood, Colo.-based company agreed to invest $2.5 billion for a 25.51 percent stake in Time Warner Entertainment.

It also marks the first time a Baby Bell has announced a cable acquisition since two proposed cable-telephone alliances failed. Earlier this year, Bell Atlantic Corp.'s proposed $21.4 billion merger with Tele-Communications Inc. and Southwestern Bell Corp.'s plan for a $4.9 billion partnership with Cox Cable Communications collapsed in the wake of the cable-rate rollbacks by the Federal Communications Commission.

US West will buy Wometco and Georgia Cable Television, which together serve about 466,000 households, or 65 percent of the cable subscribers in metropolitan Atlanta.

Over the past two years, US West has made several alliances in an attempt to offer voice, data and video services over its phone lines.

And thanks to its entry into the United Kingdom's cable market in November 1988, US West has had years of experience in the cable market. The company joined forces with TCI, the largest cable provider in the U.S., and offered combined phone and cable properties in the U.K. The joint venture, known as TeleWest, has 252,000 cable customers and 182,000 phone lines.

With the two new cable systems, US West will be entering an attractive market. Atlanta is the ninth-largest metropolitan statistical area and was the third-fastest-growing large market in the U.S. between 1980 and 1990, the company said.

The Atlanta agreement also includes the acquisition of Access Telecommunications Interconnect, which provides competitive telephone services to business customers in the Atlanta area. US West will gain more than 400 route miles of fiber from that acquisition.

"We intend to seize scale and scope advantages across all US West and Time Warner properties, including purchasing, programming, business systems, research, network design, service deployment and standards development," said Tom Pardun, president of the US West Multimedia Group.