REGINA, SK – Lots of news from Sasktel today, as the company announced new nationwide roaming coverage for its 4G LTE customers, as well as expansion of some of its high speed internet services in different communities across Saskatchewan.
With today’s announcement that its 4G LTE customers will be able to roam anywhere in Canada using LTE, Sasktel says it is now the nation’s provider of the largest Canada-wide LTE coverage. “We are very pleased to now offer our wireless customers with access to the largest Canada-wide LTE coverage,” said Ron Styles, SaskTel president and CEO, in a release. “In addition, only SaskTel wireless customers have Canada-wide data, with no data overage charges.”
Launched in January, SaskTel’s LTE network is currently available in Regina, Saskatoon, Clavet, Dundurn, Langham, Lumsden, Martensville, Osler, Pense, Vanscoy, Warman, White City Dalmeny and Balgonie. Throughout 2013, SaskTel will continue to expand the 4G LTE network to Estevan, Moose Jaw, North Battleford, Prince Albert, Swift Current, Weyburn and Yorkton.
The company also announced that it has set up high speed internet service for two more First Nations communities, Poundmaker and Sweet Grass First Nations.
This expansion is part of an initiative that was first announced in 2010, aimed at providing high speed internet service and 4G coverage to 28 First Nations communities in Saskatchewan.
“We are very excited to be able to expand this world class network to another two First Nations communities,” said Styles, “and would like to thank our partners, Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada, the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations (FSIN) and the Saskatoon Tribal Council for their ongoing contributions to this important project.”
Over in Moose Jaw, SaskTel announced that residential customers can now sign up for infiNET, SaskTel’s new fibre optic network. The company says it hopes to have all of its high speed internet and maxTV customers in Moose Jaw connected within a year, and others will also have the opportunity to sign up for infiNET once their residential area is converted to fibre. For business customers in Moose Jaw, Sasktel will start deploying its first business-grade infiNET services in the city’s downtown core by fall 2013.
Sasktel is working on several projects designed to upgrade its broadband network in the province’s nine largest urban centers – Saskatoon, Regina, Moose Jaw, Weyburn, Estevan, Swift Current, Yorkton, North Battleford and Prince Albert. infiNET is being deployed through SaskTel’s Fibre to the Premises (FTTP) Program, a seven-year $670 million dollar investment to deploy fibre directly to homes and upgrade the broadband network in these cities.
Fibre to the Business (FTTB) is Sasktel’s $32.5 million four-year project to build out the fibre infrastructure in the downtown cores of the province’s nine major cities. FTTB will offer speeds that far exceed those of SaskTel’s current network and will allow SaskTel to deploy speeds up to 260 Mbps initially, with the capacity to significantly increase speeds over time.
