RCN Business Services, a division of RCN Corporation, has signed a multi-year contract and service extension with Highgate Hotels that includes an upgrade to five New York metropolitan area hotels.

As part of the upgrade, RCN will be using its fiber-optic network to deliver digital cable TV and HDTV services to hotel rooms without requiring the rooms to have set-top boxes. RCN will also integrate with Highgate Hotels’ third-party VOD providers and other service integrators.

For its part in the upgrade, Highgate Hotels will be adding new HD TV sets in its rooms.

“Our team offered a technically advanced solution to satisfy the needs of a very diverse set of properties,” added Brad Martin, Sr. Director of Marketing and Operations, RCN Business Services. “We understood from the beginning that it was of the utmost importance that each of the general managers felt confident in the service provider’s ability to deliver a solution that fell within budget, easily integrated with existing infrastructure and would cause the least amount of disruption to guests.”

RCN will upgrade existing service to the DoubleTree Metropolitan, Radisson Lexington and Park Central Hotels. While RCN has provided service to a portion of the Highgate Hotels portfolio in New York for some time, two of the phase-one properties, Hampton Inn and Hilton Garden Inn, are shifting cable television service to RCN from a competitive provider.

RCN Business Services said it expects to have all five, phase-one Highgate properties operational by February.

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