The New York Times > Technology > SBC in Deal With Microsoft to Provide TV on High-Speed Lines From the (I hate the) New York Times. SBC Communications, as part of its effort to compete head-on with the cable industry for television subscribers, plans to announce today that it will pay $400 million to Microsoft for software used to deliver TV programming over high-speed data lines. Let the competition begin! (Thanks, Lost Remote) CNET’s Take.