By Ahmad Hathout
SATELLITE COMPANY TELESAT is gearing up to deliver details of its low-earth orbit constellation before the end of the year, its vice-president of North American sales said Friday.
“The plan is to announce the kick-off of our build program before year-end, and at this point we’re still on track to deliver our constellation,” Michele Beck said Friday at the virtual Canada’s Rural & Remote Broadband Conference. Telesat said it will have one part of its constellation in service by early 2023.
Telesat has yet to announce who will build its fleet of satellites or who will launch them. The…
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By Denis Carmel
OTTAWA – In our last story about Bill C-10, the long-awaited Act to amend the Broadcasting Act, Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault wanted to proceed quickly to and through second reading. Passage from second reading is normally a prerequisite before a bill goes to the Heritage Committee for study.
That was two weeks ago. Word is that debate could resume Friday, December 4, along with Bill C-11 on Privacy Protection.
Considering the House will break for the Holidays on December 11, there is slight chance the Committee will start sitting this year, possibly with government presenting the bill to…
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By Robert Ghiz
CANADA’S REGULATORS HAVE long recognized that facilities-based competition is the best way to achieve the objectives of high-quality services, wide network coverage, and affordable prices. Favouring facilities-based competition has resulted in billions of dollars of private investment, building the fastest mobile wireless networks in the world. Even in rural areas Canada’s networks perform better than the overall networks in most other countries.
This combination of quality and coverage, together with an intensely competitive mobile wireless market evidenced by a steady decline in prices, is why a recent report commissioned by the U.S. wireless industry association…
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By Denis Carmel
OTTAWA – Foreign-based vendors with no physical presence in Canada do not have to charge Canadians GST/HST on sales of digital products or services — like mobile apps, online video gaming (not to mention purchases within apps and games) and video and music streaming. Nor do they pay taxes on earnings from Canadian consumers.
In today’s economic statement from the federal government, however, foreign-based vendors selling digital products or services to consumers in Canada (such as Netflix, Spotify and others) will be required to register for, collect and remit the GST/HST on their taxable sales to Canadian consumers.
The…
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By Ahmad Hathout
OTTAWA – The task of figuring out how the different broadband programs of the federal government and the CRTC will be co-ordinated was made a little easier by the regulator’s chairman Ian Scott on Thursday.
Posed with a question from a member of parliament about whether the CRTC should have control of the entire broadband budget — not just the regulator’s own $750-million Broadband Fund — Scott said the different programs have different focuses, and funding could come down to how those programs measure connected areas.
Earlier this year, rural economic development minister Maryam Monsef announced the UBF has…
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By Doug Barrett
FOR SOMEONE AS QUEASY as me worrying major chunks of the Canadian broadcasting system might end up in the hands of foreign owners, Denis Carmel’s article (Will Bill C-10 do away with Canadian Ownership?) last week was not particularly reassuring.
Mr. Carmel quoted a statement provided by the Department of Canadian Heritage which said:
“The Bill makes no changes regarding the requirements for Canadian ownership and control of traditional broadcasters. The CRTC will continue to license traditional broadcasters. Only Canadian individuals, companies and organizations, as defined in the Direction to the CRTC on the Ineligibility of Non-Canadians, will…
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Why only MVNOs can check the market power of the incumbents (Part Two)
By Tim Denton
THE SECOND MAJOR PORTION of the MacDonald-Menzies argument (part one can be read here) against mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) is what I call the transmission argument. It holds that, by preventing conditions that would allow effective MVNOs, the profits left in the large carriers will be translated into investment in less profitable or unprofitable rural and remote broadband access.
Why would any rational capitalist organization reduce its return on investment to satisfy the distributive goals of the Canadian state? In various times, management of…
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VANCOUVER — With a commitment to invest up to $100 million, Telus today announced the launch of its new Telus Pollinator Fund for Good, what it calls a “social impact fund” which will invest in new sustainable businesses that drive enhanced societal outcomes in healthcare, agriculture, environment, and social and economic inclusion.
“The Pollinator Fund for Good represents the progression of Telus’ social capitalism thesis, as we invest in entrepreneurs and responsible businesses that share our belief that to do well as a company, we must do ‘good’ in the communities where we live, work and serve,” said Darren Entwistle,…
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By Tim Denton
CHRIS MACDONALD, UNTIL RECENTLY a commissioner of the CRTC, and Peter Menzies, former vice-chairman of telecom at the same agency, recently published a paper called Building Internet Access is Job 1. We think it is a useful contribution to public discussion of matters of national importance. There is much that the Internet Society likes. Before we get on to the subject of mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) – where we differ – we want to set forth our agreements of several large issues.
Its central thesis is regulation involves bargains where various conflicting objectives must be balanced.
Decision-makers…
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By John Bugailiskis
TWO YEARS AGO AT the 2018 Canadian Telecom Summit, industry executives largely agreed that for 5G to live up to its hype, service providers would have to forge new partnerships with non-traditional businesses and industries across Canada.
Jump ahead two years to yesterday’s virtual 2020 Telecom Summit panel on 5G and the only noticeable change is the (virtual) setting, not the outlook. The deployment of 5G will be marathon, not a sprint and the revolutionary changes will eventually arrive, but not for several more years predicted this year’s expert panel.
For telecom giants used to forging their own path…
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