OTTAWA – Communications giant Bell Media was batting .500 Friday after the CRTC awarded it a win, and a loss, in two final offer arbitration disputes between it and the Canadian Independent Distributors Group (CIDG) and Telus.
In its decision on Bell Media versus the CIDG, a group consisting of the CCSA, Cogeco and MTS, the Commission noted that both sides made “significant strides” to resolve the issues between them, and that both offers provided commercially reasonable terms and more consumer choice.
The CIDG final offer affiliation agreement, however, was “inconsistent” with the standstill rule of the Commission’s vertical…
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MONTREAL – Cogeco Cable is expanding into the U.S. after buying Atlantic Broadband for US$1.36 billion, the company announced Wednesday.
Atlantic is the 14th largest cable television system operator in the United States, serving about 252,000 basic video customers in Pennsylvania, Florida, Maryland, Delaware and South Carolina. It also offers high speed Internet and telephony services.
"This acquisition marks an attractive entry point into the U.S. market for Cogeco Cable”, said president and CEO Louis Audet, in a statement. “There are sizable opportunities for growth including: increasing the penetration of the small and mid-sized business segment, and maximizing the bundling potential…
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MONTREAL – Profits and revenues at Cogeco Inc. continued to rise for the third quarter of fiscal 2012.
Profits bounced back to $55.4 million this quarter, compared to a $179.2 million loss in the same period of the previous fiscal year which was mostly attributable to the write-off of its net investment in its Cabovisao Portuguese subsidiary.
For the period ended May 31, revenue was $358 million, up 8.4% from $330 million in the same quarter last year, primarily due to its cable sector and recent acquisition of Metromedia. Cable revenue grew 7.2% to $319.8 million from $298.2 million, while revenue…
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GATINEAU – Unless there is a last minute change of heart from one side or the other, a panel of three CRTC commissioners will soon decide the terms of the next carriage agreements for 29 Bell Media specialty channels on a number of independent BDUs.
The Commission panel will choose one offer over the other in the final stage – known as Final Offer Arbitration (FOA), sometimes referred to as “baseball arbitration” – of this carriage battle. It’s high-risk business brinksmanship. In Major League Baseball, if a player and his team can’t come to a negotiated salary agreement, an arbitrator…
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OTTAWA – Telus, Cogeco, Eastlink and MTS Allstream have all told the CRTC that they are opposed to BCE and Rogers’ proposal to take control of sports channels Leafs TV, NBA TV Canada and Gol TV Canada from parent Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment (MLSE).
The interventions filed by the independent distributors claim that the move, which comes as part of the BCE/Rogers $1.32 billion bid for a majority stake in MLSE, “are bad for the Canadian broadcasting industry, further extending the control exerted by these large vertically integrated conglomerates”.
“Increasing the already extensive market power enjoyed by vertically integrated programming…
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MONTREAL – When Cogeco Diffusion purchased three regional music radio stations from Corus Quebec in 2011, they were "moribund," vice-president Richard Lachance told journalists on Wednesday.
In one case, with a two per cent market share, "the photocopier reached more people," he joked.
So the broadcaster is reinventing those three stations (which were part of a larger, $80 million 10-station purchase announced in spring 2010), changing their format from music/talk to news/talk and hoping to replicate the huge ratings success the company has seen with talk radio in Montreal.
The three stations – CKOY-FM…
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TORONTO – Cogeco Data Services celebrated the opening of its new state-of-the-art data centre in the heart of Toronto's business district.
The new centre will serve local customers as well as organizations requiring easy access and low latency connections to Canada's largest business and financial institutions. The company said that the move comes as more organizations move from on-site environments to cloud computing and hybrid service models.
"The trend has been to move data centres outside the downtown core because real estate is at a premium in major economic hubs like Toronto," said president Tony Ciciretto, in the announcement. "But Canada's largest business…
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GATINEAU – The CRTC will stage a public hearing starting Tuesday morning to consider 18 renewal applications from radio stations that are in apparent non-compliance with the Commission’s radio regulations and/or certain conditions of licence.
One of the applicants, Aboriginal Voices Radio (AVR), issued a statement Monday accusing the Commission of censorship after being directed to restrict its presentation to matters pertaining to its licences for CKAV-FM Toronto, CKAV-FM-2 Vancouver, CKAV-FM-3 Calgary, CKAV-FM-4 Edmonton and CKAV-FM-9 Ottawa. AVR, in association with the National Indigenous Media Association of Canada, had proposed that the CRTC also review its native broadcasting policy at that…
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TORONTO and MONTREAL – The Independent Production Fund is investing $1.5 million in 15 new Canadian web drama series.
The scripted drama series (10 English / 5 French) represent a range of genres including comedy, adventure, thriller, sci-fi and fantasy for different target demographics and distribution platforms (click here for the list of 2012 recipients).
The IPF, which is incorporated as a private foundation with charitable status, operates on the interest generated by a $33 million endowment and by recoupment from its investments. Through locations in Toronto and Montreal, it also administers the Cogeco Program Development Fund and the Bell Broadcast…
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MONTREAL – Cogeco Cable has rolled out its new Internet packages in Cornwall and Leamington, ON.
The new Turbo 20 package offers a download speed of up to 20 Mbps, upload speeds of up to 1.5 Mbps and a monthly data transfer capacity of 80 GB. For this package, bandwidth usage that exceeds the specified monthly data transfer capacity limit will be billed at $1.50 per additional GB, with a maximum of $50 per month.
The package is currently available for a promotional price of $44.95 per month for 12 months for customers who also subscribe to Cogeco's television and/or home…
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