Comcast 2015 Annual Report Download - page 45

not subject to minimum-term contracts for their services, while substantially all of our business customers
are. Minimum-term contracts are typically 2 years in length for residential customers and typically range from
2 to 5 years for business services customers. Customers with minimum-term contracts may only discontinue
service in accordance with the terms of their contracts, which may include an early termination fee.
Residential Cable Services
Our Cable Communications segment offers a broad variety of video service packages that may include pre-
mium networks such as HBO, Showtime, Starz and Cinemax; pay-per-view services; and our On Demand
service. Our video customers may subscribe for additional fees to our high-definition video (“HD”) and digital
video recorder (“DVR”) advanced services. We are actively deploying X1 set-top boxes throughout our foot-
print and have launched Cloud DVR technology in substantially all of our markets.
We offer residential customers a variety of high-speed Internet services with downstream speeds of up to 150
Mbps and downstream speeds of up to 505 Mbps in limited markets. We are actively deploying wireless
gateways throughout our footprint, which combine a customer’s wireless router, cable modem and voice
adapter, to improve the performance of multiple Internet-enabled devices used at the same time within the
home, provide faster Internet speeds and create an in-home Wi-Fi network. We are continuing to expand our
network of residential, outdoor and business Wi-Fi hotspots to allow most of our high-speed Internet custom-
ers to access our high-speed Internet services inside and outside the home, and we provide access to
approximately 13.3 million of these hotspots as of December 31, 2015.
We offer voice services that provide local and long-distance calling and other related features.
Business Services
We offer our cable services to small and medium-sized businesses, and more recently, we have begun to
offer services to large enterprises with multiple locations (“business services”). We offer to medium-sized
businesses and large enterprises Ethernet network services that connect multiple locations and provide
higher downstream and upstream speed options. We also provide cellular backhaul services to mobile net-
work operators to help those customers manage network bandwidth.
Advertising
Our Cable Communications segment also sells advertising. As part of our distribution agreements with cable
networks, we generally receive an allocation of scheduled advertising time on cable networks that our Spot-
light business sells to local, regional and national advertisers.
Operating Margin
Our Cable Communications segment operating margin is operating income before depreciation and amor-
tization as a percentage of revenue. The most significant operating costs and expenses for our Cable
Communications segment are the programming expenses we incur to provide content to our video custom-
ers. As further discussed in Cable Communications Segment Results of Operations, we expect that our
programming expenses will continue to increase, which may negatively impact our operating margin. We will
attempt to mitigate increases in operating costs and expenses by growing revenue, particularly in our high-
speed Internet, video and business services businesses.
NBCUniversal Segments
NBCUniversal is one of the world’s leading media and entertainment companies that develops, produces and
distributes entertainment, news and information, sports, and other content for global audiences, as well as
owns and operates several theme parks worldwide.
Comcast 2015 Annual Report on Form 10-K 42