OTTAWA – The ‘Say No To Bell’ coalition is taking issue with Bell’s interpretation of its Canadian TV viewing share should its acquisition of Astral Media be allowed to proceed.
The group, spearheaded by Cogeco, Eastlink, and Quebcor, issued a statement challenging Bell’s calculation that the combined English-language market share of Bell Canada and Astral Media is 33.5%.
“The correct number for the Canada-wide English-language viewing share of the combined companies is in fact 41.4%”, reads the statement. “This goes to the heart of the problems inherent in the proposed transaction: a degree of single company market dominance greatly exceeding that of many industrialized countries. By comparison, the largest communications companies in the United States, Australia, and France have only 18.9%, 24.9%, and 26.1% market shares.”
Citing 2011 CRTC data, the coalition says that the combined English-language market share is 41.4% of 607.8 million hours, the combined French-language market share is 28.6% of 214 million hours, and the weighted national average is 37.6%.
