ISPs to receive funding include Videotron, Cogeco, Bell, Xplornet, Telus and Sogetel
TROIS-RIVIÈRES, Que. — The federal government and the government of Quebec today announced the launch of the Canada-Quebec “Operation High Speed” initiative to connect almost 150,000 underserved Quebec households to high-speed Internet by September 2022.
This initiative is being made possible by a joint investment totalling $826.3 million from the government of Canada and the Quebec government. The ISPs (which are also investing some of their own money) receiving funding through the program include Videotron, Cogeco, Bell, Xplornet, Sogetel and Telus.
Here are some of the details of each ISP’s participation in Operation High Speed:
- Videotron is receiving $257.7 million in funding and will connect 37,335 households to high-speed Internet by the end of 2022;
- Cogeco will receive $208.3 million in funding to connect 35,880 households by September 2022. The company will contribute $32 million and it appears it was the only one of the companies to outline how much they are contributing in their announcement.
- Bell has been awarded $161.5 million to connect 30,909 homes;
- Xplornet will receive $84.4 million in funding to connect 23,062 homes;
- Sogetel is receiving $79 million to connect 12,726 households; and
- Telus has been granted $26.1 million to connect 4,723 homes.
For more on the joint announcement by the Canadian and Quebec governments, please click here. Other independent ISPs also involved in smaller projects announced earlier include Targo Communications, Coop CSUR, Digicom, Groupe Maskatel, Connexion Fibre Picanoc, and Cooptel.
A French-language breakdown of the distribution of various households and ISPs’ subsidies is available here. Also, information about the regional distribution of households is available in French here.
