Verizon CEO Ivan Seidenberg Gave the TV Industry a hard pill today by telling those at the Goldman Sachs Communacopia conference that he expected the Internet to kill cable bundles. He expected that bundles would still have “some life left” but that many younger buyers were simply dropping traditional TV entirely in favor of Internet access.
“Young people are pretty smart. They’re not going to pay for something they don’t need to,” Seidenberg told AllThingsD and others at the New York City event. “Over the top is going to be a pretty big issue for cable.”
Other major TV providers have insist ed the trend towards quitting TV is isolated enough to be a very minor issue. But stats say otherwise. TV subscriptions saw their first-ever decline in recent months, leading some to believe the model has peaked.
Seidenberg has an interest in TV as IPTV is an option through FiOS. Verizon is much newer to the category, however, and depends more on its cellphone and Internet access where Comcast, Time Warner and others are tied to TV viewing.
