OTTAWA – Industry Canada made public the list of fully qualified bidders on Friday and little has changed.
Three applicants who entered the auction process, Birch Hill Equity, Vecima Networks and a numbered Alberta company headed by CCI Wireless CEO Amir Bigloo have withdrawn, leaving a dozen others, all well-known telecom industry players still in the game.
They are: Bell Mobility, Bragg Communications (Eastlink), Feenix Wireless (Mobilicity founder John Bitove is leading this one), Globalive Wireless (whose CEO, Tony Lacavera, runs Wind), MTS, Novus Wireless, Rogers Communications, SaskTel, TBayTel, Telus, The Catalyst Capital Group (one of the original Mobilicity financiers), and…
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HALIFAX – As consumers have evolved from simply surfing the web to doing virtually everything online, Eastlink has beefed up its Internet offering to keep pace with these changing needs.
Known as ‘Internet Evolved’, the enhanced service offers consumers:
– the ability to access, backup and share photos and more instantly, on any device with Eastlink Personal Cloud;
– Wi-Fi where they want and need it with Eastlink WiFi Extender that boosts their Wi-Fi to hard-to-reach areas with a seamless connection to all Wi-Fi devices;
– 24/7 support for smart TVs, computer viruses,…
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INDUSTRY MINISTER JAMES MOORE likely caused a number of folks in the Canadian subscription TV business to choke on their turkey this Thanksgiving weekend.
In a few media interviews, Moore dropped a preview bomb of this Wednesday’s Throne Speech by saying the federal Conservative government will make it its business to micromanage sectors of the economy, beginning with dismantling the TV channel packaging practices of Canadian broadcasters and broadcast distribution undertakings. “We don’t think it’s right for Canadians to have to pay for bundled television channels that they don’t watch,” he told CTV’s Question Period in an interview broadcast Sunday…
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OTTAWA – There is no working market for domestic wholesale roaming in Canada, which has led to sky-high rates that injure competition, says Halifax-based cable and wireless company Eastlink. Conversely, Bell Mobility argues new entrants have the choice of three providers, all of which are girding for roaming business.
In comments to the CRTC’s investigation into domestic and international roaming, Eastlink says the incumbents’ wholesale domestic roaming rates are much higher than their retail rates and thus “are inherently commercially unreasonable.” It adds these rates “are a significant obstacle to new entrants’ ability to compete over…
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OTTAWA – C’mon kids, grab those old mobile devices: the Recycle My Cell student challenge is back for a fourth year.
As the national sponsor of Waste Reduction Week in Canada (October 21-27), Recycle My Cell is challenging all Canadian schools and post-secondary institutions to recycle as many old wireless devices as possible, including cell phones, smartphones, wireless PDAs, pagers, accessories and cell phone batteries.
The school in each province and territory that collects the most cell phones (based on school population) will be awarded $500 to be used towards a school environmental project. Last year, more than…
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WHILE THE CANADIAN WIRELESS world and the politicians who oversee it spent the dog days of summer 2013 barking at each other over policies they said were either wrecking the business or boosting competition (depending on your point of view) one player, Halifax-based Eastlink, remained largely silent.
While Eastlink is a big deal in Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island especially, and does daily battle down East with Bell Aliant, CEO, Lee Bragg told Cartt.ca in a recent interview that adding his own voice to that cacophony would have accomplished little. And besides, even though he can’t side with government…
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TORONTO – Despite deeply discounted pricing, Canada’s new wireless entrants are expected to own only 7% of the wireless market by the end of this year, according to a new report from Convergence Consulting.
Canadian Wireless: Assessing the Impact of New Entrants says that Wind Mobile, Public Mobile and Mobilicity are undercutting incumbents Rogers, Bell and Telus and their discount brands on voice packages by up to 58% and 40% respectively, and on combined voice/data packages by up to 63% and 57% respectively.
In some cases, such as with regional providers like EastLink and Videotron, the incumbents and their discount brands…
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MONT TREMBLANT – The Canadian Cable Systems Alliance celebrated its 20th anniversary in grand style Monday with top notch seminars, a well-attended trade show, awards and a gala dinner which featured Canadian comic Sugar Sammy.
After an opening speech by CRTC vice-chairman telecom Peter Menzies, “unmarketing” pro Scott Stratten wowed the audience with an entertaining take on how in order to go viral, you have to give up control (and don’t sweat your logo too much). Then, with over 300 delegates at this year’s conference, the trade show floor was packed through mid-day then customer service…
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OTTAWA – As widely suspected, no foreign wireless carriers were named as potential bidders for the 700 MHz wireless spectrum according to the list released by Industry Canada early Monday morning.
The 15 potential bidders includes incumbents Bell Mobility, Telus and Rogers Communications, as well as regional carriers MTS, SaskTel, T-Bay Tel, EastLink/Bragg Communications and Videotron. Also named is Wind Mobile parent Globalive Wireless, fixed-wireless operator Vecima and Vancouver-based Novus Wireless.
While new entrant Mobilicity is not on the list, another company owned by its chairman John Bitove, known as Feenix Wireless Inc. is, as is private equity investors Birch Hill Equity Partners and The Catalyst…
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TORONTO – Scotia Capital analyst Jeff Fan told investors on Wednesday what many had already expected: None of Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, or T-Mobile USA have submitted applications to take part in the 700 MHz wireless spectrum auction here, he wrote in a note to clients, after speaking with officials at each company.
This is good news for Canadian telecom shareholders. “We believe the absence of a large US operator removes a threat for the Canadian wireless carriers,” he wrote. “We believe their decisions to not enter is due to their focus on the domestic market, the lack of attractive return…
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