TV land is bracing for a new wave of cuts after the takeovers of two big cable players.
Employees of Time Warner Cable and Cablevision are scrambling to line up jobs with the expectation that there will be more layoffs and belt-tightening in the coming months, sources said.
Bethpage, Long Island-based Cablevision is being acquired by European communications giant Altice, while Charter Communications just closed on the acquisition of New York-based Time Warner Cable.
Time Warner Cable staff are “being booted and some are being signed by Charter,” said one source.
“People are being phased out, and most people know their fate,” added the source, noting that a number of workers have decades of service under their belts.
Joan Gillman, Time Warner Cable’s executive vice president of media services, sent a blast email on Thursday, saying she’s leaving after the takeover.
“As many of you know, as the Charter management team takes over, I will be moving on, with many of my colleagues,” she wrote.
Tom Montemagno, Cablevision’s executive vice president of programming, is also set to exit, said sources familiar with the situation.
Altice boss Patrick Drahi has promised to wring $900 million in cost savings from Cablevision and Suddenlink, the smaller US cable operator it purchased last year. He also singled out Cablevision’s top-paid managers for the chopping block.
In a sign of employee paranoia, a paper towel shortage at Cablevision prompted rumors that ruthless cost-cutting was already under way — which a spokesman promptly dismissed.
Meanwhile, Tom Rutledge, the chief executive of Charter, told investors on Thursday that he is looking to extract $400 million in cost savings from programmers now that he has seen Time Warner Cable’s contracts with its major partners.