A Brief Overview of Comcast’s Business Segments

Comcast (CMCSA) has two primary businesses, Cable Communications and NBCUniversal. As discussed in the previous part of this series, Comcast acquired NBCUniversal from General Electric (GE) in 2013. Comcast’s NBCUniversal businesses consist of Cable Networks, Broadcast Television, Filmed Entertainment, and Theme Parks. Comcast also operates a sports management company, Comcast Spectacor, which operates in 48 states in the United States. Additionally, Comcast has a venture capital unit, Comcast Ventures, which invests in the advertising, consumer, enterprise, and infrastructure sectors.

In this article, we’ll focus on Comcast’s Cable Communications business. Cable Communications provides triple play services, which are video, voice, and HSI (high-speed Internet) services under the XFINITY brand. It also offers products such as the X1 Platform, a video on demand service, the XFINITY TV app, and PowerBoost.

Comcast’s XFINITY television is an interactive television format that uses Comcast’s cloud computing infrastructure and offers its viewers personalized searches and recommendations. Comcast has also started offering Stream on the XFINITY Internet platform. Stream offers live streaming at home to Comcast’s XFINITY users.

Comcast’s XFINITY Internet offers flexible Internet plans and services including the Extreme 505 Internet tier and the XFINITY wireless gateways. Comcast also offers Internet Essentials, a broadband service at a reduced price for lower-income families. This program has connected 350,000 low-income families to the Internet as of August 2014.

Comcast’s XFINITY Voice services include XFINITY Connect and the XFINITY Connect mobile app, a central dashboard to check emails and listen to and send voice and text messages at home and on the go.

Verizon Communications’ (VZ) Verizon Wireless has an agreement with Comcast to offer its voice, video, and Internet products on Verizon’s 4G mobile network. Comcast’s XFINITY Internet customers can also access 1 million free Wi-Fi hotspots in the United States and download a range of free XFINITY apps on Apple (AAPL) and Alphabet’s (GOOG) Android devices.

Comcast’s Cable Communications business also offers triple play services to businesses and an advertising solutions business. The company makes up 2.6% of the PowerShares QQQ Trust Series 1 ETF (QQQ). For an investor interested in getting exposure to television and radio, QQQ has 4.4% exposure to the sector.