Eagle Broadband acquires DSS Security

LEAGUE CITY, Texas-A broadband provider that serves developed communities in Texas and the Southwest has bought a Houston-based security company, including its central station and its 3,000 accounts. With its purchase of DSS Security, Eagle Broadband, through its ClearWorks Communications subsidiary, will now use the DSS central station in Houston to monitor its security accounts, said Manny Carter, president and chief operating officer of Eagle Broadband. Eagle previously used two different contract central stations for its 200 or so accounts, Carter said. Owner Paul DeShazo said the opportunity to sell his residential business will now allow him to focus on his commercial customers. Both sides of the business had always been kept separate, he said. "Selling residential accounts was never a primary part of my business," he said. "This will allow us to focus on things like card readers, cameras and commercial fire." The two sides of DeShazo's business were maintained in separate offices with separate employees. Most of his residential accounts were installed by building subcontractors, and his company programmed and monitored the accounts, he said. DeShazo will keep his commercial division, DSS, but will continue to monitor his 400 commercial accounts, mostly office buildings, through his old central station, he said. Eagle will also use the DSS customer base as new targets for its Bundled Digital Services package that includes a fiber optic offering with services such as cable television, local and long distance telephone and high-speed Internet. The addition of the central station also give Eagle the capacity to grow its security operations up to 14,000 accounts, which is the operating capacity of the central station, Carter said. "We intend to intensify our marketing of security in areas like San Antonio, Austin and Phoenix," Carter said. The company will also add additional sales staff in the Houston area as well as in Dallas to increase the number of subscribers that are located outside the number of communities already served by the company's bundled fiber offerings. Eagle's security monitoring offerings already bring in about $1 million a year, Carter said, but DSS will add about $200,000 in annual profit from the monitoring operations.