QUISPAMSIS, N.B. – The Canadian Cable Systems Alliance and Power & Telephone Supply Canada announced today their completion of a bulk purchase master agreement for Commscope drop and hardline cable, strand, drop connectors, and pole & drop line hardware.
With a subscriber base of approximately one million, the CCSA represents the commercial interests of 93 independent member companies for group purchases of programming, equipment and services.
“We are pleased to endorse Power & Tel as CCSA’s supplier of drop cable, hardline cable, strand, drop connectors and pole and drop line hardware,” said Sylvia Janssen, director of purchasing at CCSA,…
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IT’S NOT OFTEN THAT a family-owned cable company will bring in an outsider to run it. Especially a telco guy.
But, when that cable operation is in the middle of turning into a telephone company, too, it doesn’t seem like such a bad idea after all. Until June of this year, John Piercy was working as a consultant to Hamilton’s Mountain Cablevision, working out the kinks in its telephony offering, leading up to this past summer’s launch.
That’s when Owen Boris (Mountain’s founder) and his son Les asked Piercy (right) to come aboard full time as president. Les is…
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OTTAWA – Seaside Communications owner Irving Schwartz has been named to the CCTA Honour List.
It’s the highest award bestowed by the Canadian Cable Industry and was created in 1973 to recognize individuals who have made leadership and excellence the hallmark of their career in the cable television industry and the Communities they serve.
The Canadian Cable Telecommunications Association had intended to honour Schwartz (right) a couple of weeks ago in Gravenhurst during its Galaxi Awards presentations at Cable Week.
However, Schwartz was feeling under the weather that week and didn’t make the trip from Cape Breton Island, which…
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GRAVENHURST, Ont. – The final day of the Canadian Cable Systems Alliance annual general meeting last Thursday was both informative and thirst-quenching.
While the first day was all about a trade show and golf, as reported by www.cartt.ca, day two was education-focused.
After hearing in the morning from lawyer Purdy Crawford on the value of leadership and American Cable Association president Matthew Polka on what’s up Stateside, Canadian Digital Television president and high definition missionary Michael McEwen outlined recent progress in HD deployment.
Most of his figures were out of the U.S.
Ninety percent…
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GRAVENHURST – The Canadian Cable Systems Alliance’s table-top trade show Wednesday morning (right) was an unqualified success, members and vendors told www.cartt.ca.
With over 200 delegates registered for the AGM and 32 tables filled with vendors’ wares at the Taboo Resort, this is the largest CCSA AGM in memory.
Some brand new product was unveiled at the show, such as the new interactive program guide from Aptiv. Aptiv is the former IPG division of Pioneer Digital, which has been spun off into a new company. Regina’s Access Communications is the first Canadian MSO to roll out the attractive, intuitive…
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THE CTV-MTV DEAL announced today, while very important for CTV and awfully painful for CHUM, which loses its MTV content, is just a little piece of the enormous change the broadcast television industry is facing – on a number of fronts.
To me, it’s part of “the new TV,” for lack of a better term, where traditional boundaries are quickly breaking down. The lines between broadcast, specialty and pay are blurring to the point that they matter less and less from a viewer’s perspective every day.
People watch shows. They want content. The fact that it’s on CTV or…
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GRAVENHURST, Ont. – Canada’s two cable system organizations are getting together to hold their annual gatherings at the same time and place next month.
The Canadian Cable Systems Alliance annual general meeting will be held on September 28th and 29th at the Taboo Resort, Golf & Conference Centre in Gravenhurst, Ontario, about 90 minutes north of Toronto’s Pearson airport.
The Canadian Cable Television Association’s business day and Galaxi Awards presentation will be at the same venue on Tuesday September 27th for the convenience of the joint attendees.
Here’s an outline of the week’s events.
Tuesday, Sept. 27th – CCTA business…
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OTTAWA – Former Fundy Cable exec and Canadian Cable Systems Alliance founder Barbara Stanley has been appointed to a three year term on the governing council for the National Research Council.
Industry Minister David Emerson made the announcement yesterday, also adding B.C. biotech lawyer James Hatton to the same board.
"These appointments strengthen the work of the National Research Council in many ways," said Minister Emerson, in a release. "James Hatton and Barbara Stanley have extensive experience working in the private and public sectors and will bring a wealth of knowledge to the research and development being performed at…
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WHILE WE CAN’T SAY for sure that Compton Communications will be the smallest North American video on demand provider when it launches this fall, we figure it’s pretty unlikely that many other 5,000-customer cable companies in Canada or the U.S. are planning on offering it that soon.
It’s a very expensive technology, fraught with difficult to solve issues, especially for a small operator. Think Paramount’s EVP of programming will have Compton’s VOD launch on his priority list, for example?
Compton Cable (which serves the Port Perry, Ont. region, about an hour’s drive northeast of Toronto, on Lake Scugog) has…
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LIVING IN THE BIG CITIES, it’s easy to forget – or to never think about – what it’s like in smaller, more remote communities.
A few months ago, I mentioned to a small operator how a far larger MSO still had some substantial 330 MHz and 450 MHz cable systems remaining to rebuild (with just a little mocking disdain in my voice). His response was a little bit sarcastic, wondering what’s wrong with systems like that, since much of his programming and data was still being delivered over such plant to presumably happy customers.
It cleared my head and…
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