FCC Slaps Conditions on Comcast-NBCU Deal

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- The Federal Communications Commission has proposed a set of regulatory conditions on the pending Comcast(CMCSA) merger with NBC Universal in efforts to guarantee that the cable company won't be able to monopolize competition in the video market once it gains control of NBC from General Electric(GE).

FCC chairman Julius Genachowski has proposed new guidelines for the merger to prevent Comcast from withholding NBC's media content from pay-TV and online competitors, such as Cablevision(CVC), Time Warner Cable(TWC), Netflix(NFLX) and Apple(AAPL).

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Genachowski wants to ensure that rival pay-TV providers and Internet video distributors will still be able to carry NBC programming.

Comcast now expects to complete its joint venture in early 2011, a date pushed back from the end of 2010, as it had originally projected.

Management has worked for the past year to accommodate requests of the regulators. Comcast executive vice president David Cohen said the company remains committed to consumers and will deliver "real public interest benefits."

"We made a number of significant commitments on day one designed to assure the government and the public that the public interest would be served and these benefits realized," Cohen said in response to the FCC's regulatory proposal for the merger. "We have continued to refine and enhance our commitments throughout the year long review by the FCC and the [Department of Justice]."

NBCU CEO Jeffrey Zucker sent a memo to employees Wednesday saying that the companies now expect the merger to be completed in January of the new year.

"We have made substantial progress this month with both the FCC and the Department of Justice, and expect that we will get a 'green light' in January," Zucker said in the note.

The deal is waiting on regulatory approval from both the FCC and the Department of Justice.

"The official close of the transaction would happen shortly after government approval," Zucker said in the memo. "Until then, of course, business continues as normal."

Shares of Comcast are up 0.16% to $22.22 today, while GE's stock is up 0.94% to $18.21.

-- Written by Theresa McCabe in Boston.

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