WaveDivision Capital

Founder and CEO Steve Weed sets investment strategy, drawing on his experience as the long-time CEO of Wave Broadband. He is joined by Managing Directors Harold Zeitz and Wayne Schattenkerk, both Wave Broadband alumni. The three principals form a tight decision-making group — Zeitz simultaneously operates as CEO of Ziply Fiber, the firm's largest portfolio company, giving WDC direct operational oversight of its principal asset.

In May 2020, WaveDivision Capital partnered with Searchlight Capital Partners to acquire Frontier Communications' Pacific Northwest operations — covering Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and Montana — for $1.35 billion. Weed's team rebranded the assets as Ziply Fiber and launched a $500 million fiber-to-the-home capital program, funded in part by co-investors PSP Investments and CPP Investments. The deal exemplifies WDC's carve-out strategy: buy neglected infrastructure from over-levered corporate parents, inject operational expertise from the Wave Broadband playbook, and rebuild the network.

WDC invests directly, typically structuring individual special-purpose vehicles around specific broadband networks or infrastructure assets. The firm does not operate a traditional blind-pool fund. Instead, it assembles capital on a deal-by-deal basis, often bringing in institutional co-investors such as Searchlight Capital, PSP Investments, CPP Investments, and The Pritzker Organization alongside its own commitment.

Broadband infrastructure — fiber networks, cable systems, and related real assets — forms the core of WDC's portfolio. The firm also reviews venture-stage technology and telecommunications opportunities, though its balance-sheet commitments are overwhelmingly concentrated in control-oriented infrastructure deals. Geographically, WDC focuses on the Pacific Northwest and, through its relationship with The Pritzker Organization on Hargray Communications, has extended into the Southeastern United States.

WDC created Ziply Fiber in 2020 from the acquired Frontier Northwest assets and remains its controlling shareholder alongside Searchlight Capital Partners. WDC Managing Director Harold Zeitz serves as Ziply's CEO, making Ziply an operating company managed directly by WDC's leadership rather than by a separate portfolio-company executive team. WDC's Kirkland headquarters sits roughly two miles from Ziply's own offices.

No. WaveDivision Capital is an asset manager and investment firm, not a single-family office. While Steve Weed is the founder and likely the largest principal, the firm manages outside institutional capital — including commitments from Searchlight Capital, PSP Investments, CPP Investments, and The Pritzker Organization — rather than serving solely as a private wealth vehicle.

Weed spent roughly fifteen years as CEO of Wave Broadband, a Kirkland-based cable and internet provider he grew from a single system into a regional operator with 450,000 subscribers across Washington, Oregon, and Northern California. He sold Wave Broadband in 2018 and founded WaveDivision Capital shortly thereafter, bringing several senior Wave Broadband executives with him to build an investment firm focused on the same sector.