Search Results for: eastlink

Cable / Telecom News

CTAM TeleSeminar is this Thursday at various venues

TORONTO – Several venues across Canada will host the CTAM TeleSeminar on March 1 entitled: Hot Ideas to Keep your Customers Cool. It will take place from noon to 1:30 p.m. ET and will be delivered via satellite to local chapters throughout the United States, Canada and the Caribbean. At each of the Canadian locations, there will be a short reception to follow the TeleSeminar. The interactive event features a panel of cable executives discussing how marketing can work with other departments to improve the customer experience. The panel, moderated by Brad Samuels, executive vice-president, affiliate sales and marketing, TV… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News

EastLink to grow OD

HALIFAX – Eastern cableco EastLink received its regional video-on-demand license from the CRTC last week. “With this license approval, EastLink will be able to expand our on demand offering to include a wider range of programming," said director of marketing Ian Lezama. Currently, EastLink only offers The Movie Network On Demand. EastLink is currently negotiating with a number of major movie studios with the objective of adding feature films to its VOD line up. "This product category is expected to see tremendous growth over the next few years as customers experience the convenience of watching what they want when… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News

EastLink spending $4.2 million on Yarmouth

HALIFAX – EastLink is investing $4.2 million to upgrade its network around the southernmost reaches of Nova Scotia and will soon launch local telephone service in Yarmouth and its surrounding communities. The upgrade to EastLink’s digital network will also enhance the quality of existing EastLink services in the Yarmouth area, said the company. Upgrade construction in Yarmouth began in November 2006 and will be completed by Summer 2007. EastLink Telephone service is available for $20 per month and customers choosing to switch to can enjoy free installation and are able to keep their existing phone number, jacks and directory… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News

EastLink, Pelmorex, Evertz, three of Canada’s 50 best-managed companies

TORONTO – Among Canada’s 50 Best Managed Companies for 2006 are three from the TV and telecom industries. After reviewing thousands of applications from companies across the country, Halifax-based cable and telecom company EastLink, broadcaster Pelmorex Media (The Weather Network/MétéoMédia) and broadcast technology manufacturer Evertz Technologies each made the list. The annual awards program is sponsored by Deloitte, CIBC Commercial Banking, National Post and Queen’s University School of Business. “The 2006 Best Managed winners are an outstanding group of Canadian-owned and managed companies that have proven their remarkable ability and commitment to apply best practices to all areas of… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News

COMMENTARY: When it comes to telecom regs, one size does not fit all

DEREGULATING LOCAL PHONE in major urban centres in 2007 seems to me to be the right thing to do. "The idea that somehow the cable guys are at a disadvantage to the telcos has not been proven so far in the entry of the cable industry in local voice," Lawson Hunter, Bell’s chief corporate officer said to me Wednesday. I agree with him. To a point. Setting aside the unprecedented use of the provision in the Telecom Act that let’s the government issue policy directives to the CRTC (until 2006, it just hadn’t been done), it’s time to… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News

COMMENTARY: Telco TV toughens up

WHEN NBTEL FIRST CAME to market in 1998 with a digital TV product serving customers in Moncton and Saint John, N.B., the cable industry laughed. Sure, it was all-digital television, but each TV needed its own set top box, channel-changing latency was a problem and due to the limitations of the early ADSL technology it used, all the TVs in the house had to be tuned to the same channel. Fine for homes without a second TV, but not so much for most folks. At the time, NBTel (which is now Aliant) was the North American leader on the… Continue Reading

Radio / Television News

A new, old marketing gimmick aims to pull TMN to top of the bundle

TORONTO – Pay TV free preview weekends were once as common as snowstorms in winter. It was the tried-and-true method of enticing cable subscribers to shell out for more movies. With the dawn of digital, however, the free preview fell out of favour because as digital grew and two new direct-to-home satellite services launched, The Movie Network added tens of thousands of subscribers through the first half of this decade. It didn’t really need to offer a free preview to get subscribers. However, as digital growth flattens, the free preview returns on Bell ExpressVu and Rogers Cable this weekend… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News

CTAM Canada: Who speaks for the consumer? They do

HALIFAX – Customers want to know they have choice in their TV channel lineups and programming selection, even if they don’t really intend to exercise that choice, EastLink co-CEO Dan McKeen told almost 50 people Monday morning at the first-ever CTAM Canada East Coast breakfast (which was sold out). Held between EastLink’s very popular CSR programming training day on Sunday and the Nova Scotia cable company’s much-anticipated Fall Classic golf tournament Monday afternoon, the morning CTAM session saw a pair of programmers (Corus Entertainment VP Lisa Lyons and Turner Networks’ Doug Lindauer) face a pair of operators (McKeen and… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News

CTAM Canada is going east

HALIFAX – Anyone looking for breakfast on October 2nd – with a dash of knowledge – should swing by the Marriott Halifax Harbourfront hotel at 8:30 a.m. AT. Held in between the EastLink CSR Training Day and the company’s annual Fall Classic Golf Tournament, the topic for the 90-minute panel session is On Demand, Who Speaks For The Consumer? So far, the panel consists of Dean MacDonald, president and CEO, Persona Communications; Dan McKeen, Co-CEO, EastLink; and Lisa Lyons, VP & GM of MaxTrax/content distribution, Corus Entertainment. Another programmer will be added to the mix but that person has… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News

CCSA AGM: Commission faces cable

GRAVENHURST, Ont. – After Monday’s lunch where EastLink won the Canadian Cable Systems Alliance member of the year award and CTV the supplier of the year award, AGM delegates filled the Taboo Resort Boathouse to listen to what the CRTC had to say. The much-anticipated panel featured Ontario regional commissioner Rita Cugini, vice-chair broadcasting Michel Arpin, executive director Len Katz, senior director distribution policy and applications and head of dispute resolution Randy Hutson and CCSA president and CEO Alyson Townsend. With the demise of the Canadian Cable Television Association, Townsend talked about the CCSA’s new regulatory focus on behalf… Continue Reading