Altice USA announced that it has reached an agreement to acquire Cheddar, the digital-first news company, for $200 million.
With this acquisition, Altice broadens its portfolio of high-quality news businesses by adding Cheddar’s innovative, digital-first, live business, general news and college network focused on young professional and millennial audiences.
Cheddar joins Altice USA News, complementing Altice’s hyperlocal and global news offerings that include the most watched news channel in the Optimum footprint News 12 Networks, and international and current affairs news network i24NEWS. Cheddar Founder and CEO Jon Steinberg will join Altice USA to lead Altice News, including Cheddar, News 12 and i24NEWS.
The Cheddar networks are available in approximately 40 million pay tv homes through MVPDs (multichannel video programming distributor), all virtual MVPDs (YouTube TV, Sling, Hulu Live, DIRECTV NOW, etc.), leading free tv systems (Pluto, Roku Channel, etc.), and a campus network of 1,600 owned and operated screens on 600 campuses. Cheddar recently expanded distribution to millions of homes through various cable systems, reaching carriage agreements with Comcast, Charter and Altice USA. Cheddar is available on nearly all over-the-top subscription pay tv services in the U.S., and has large social distribution across Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, LinkedIn, Snapchat and other platforms generating over 400 million video views a month.
Dexter Goei, CEO, Altice
As one of Cheddar’s early investors, we have enjoyed our partnership with Jon and admire the entrepreneurial spirit, energy and smart disruptive mentality that he brings to the news business.
Jon Steinberg, Founder and CEO, Cheddar
Our goal is to make Altice News a leader in local, business, national, and international news everywhere as we look to build a live news offering for customers in the traditional pay TV ecosystem, as well as those looking to a la carte alternative SVOD services, vMVPDs, and free systems for their non-news entertainment.