Quebecor announced Wednesday Videotron’s discount wireless brand Fizz is making its first foray into Manitoba with a beta launch in Winnipeg.
This follows Fizz’s beta launch in Vancouver, Calgary and Edmonton in November and in Victoria and Abbotsford in December.
The fully digital wireless brand’s latest beta launch is another step in its gradual expansion into other Canadian markets over the coming months, says a Fizz press release.
Beta testers of the service will help Fizz fine-tune its product and services, and in return they can enjoy deeply discounted rates,…
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Execulink said rate reduction would improve business case for disaggregated adoption
By Ahmad Hathout
Bell and Rogers are accusing Quebecor of trying to relitigate issues on the disaggregated regime outside of the CRTC’s existing proceeding in the matter, adding the parent company of Videotron and Freedom is flip-flopping on a regime it previously thought should have been abandoned.
Quebecor filed a Part 1 application in December asking the regulator to align the access rates to large last mile fibre networks for both disaggregated and aggregated regimes in order to remain competitive. Quebecor pointed to the costs of the disaggregated…
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By Ahmad Hathout
Bell is accusing Quebecor of refusing to discuss issues related to a standard access agreement required to lease capacity from its wireless network, flipping the script on the telecom that filed a Part 1 to the CRTC alleging an undue delay in accessing that network.
By the time of the Part 1 application filed last month, the CRTC had already selected on October 10 Bell’s price for access to its network through an arbitration process. But Quebecor alleged in the undue preference complaint that Bell has delayed that access by requiring that it sign a…
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By Ahmad Hathout
Corus CEO Doug Murphy said on the company’s fiscal first quarter conference call Friday that the point at which there’s recovery in advertising demand and revenues is too early to tell, as he said the company is happy to put behind a rough 2023 in which it pleaded with the CRTC to reduce its regulatory obligations.
“On the one hand, we expect the return of new scripted programming to catalyze primetime marketing investments by our advertisers,” he said on the call. “On the other hand, the macro-economic environment remains uncertain while distortions related to post-pandemic normalization of many…
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By Ahmad Hathout
Members of Parliament on the industry committee said Thursday that they want a broad study on mobile wireless prices and want the heads of Canada’s major telecommunications companies in front of them after Rogers announced price hikes to service packages.
MPs said they want to invite to the committee Innovation Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne, Commissioner of Competition Matthew Boswell, Rogers CEO Tony Staffieri and its chief corporate affairs officer Navdeep Bains, Bell CEO Mirko Bibic, Telus CEO Darren Entwistle, and Quebecor CEO Pierre Karl Peladeau.
Some members verbally agreed that they needed Champagne and Staffieri in front of them by…
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Mels Studios and Postproduction (MELS), part of Quebecor’s TVA Group, announced Wednesday two appointments to its management team, designed to strengthen its business relationships internationally and in the Canadian market.
Jean-Philippe Normandeau has been appointed to the position of vice-president of studios and international development. In this new role, Normandeau “will optimize MELS’s development and consolidate its presence with international producers and partners,” says a press release.
He will also oversee MELS’s studio operations, with the support of Mathieu Palmieri and Marianna Del Gioacco, while continuing to serve as chief operating officer at Incendo, a…
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Bell calls application an ‘attempt to abuse the CRTC process’
By Ahmad Hathout
Quebecor is alleging that Bell is delaying access to its national wireless network despite the CRTC already determining the rate for that access.
In a Part 1 application posted Wednesday, Quebecor said it had prepared to launch services using Bell’s network on October 11 in areas where it doesn’t have a wireless network. But since the CRTC selected Bell’s rate for that access after arbitration on October 10, Quebecor alleges Bell has delayed its cooperation, which it says amounts to an anticompetitive practice.
Part of that delay,…
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By Ahmad Hathout
The Governor in Council has rejected an application to force the CRTC to relook at a decision it made that automatically renewed the broadcasting licences of major broadcasters that have been clamouring for changes to their regulatory obligations due to worsening financial conditions.
The Governor in Council said in the decision dated December 8 that it “is not satisfied that the decision derogates from the attainment of the objectives of the broadcasting policy for Canada set out in subsection 3(1) of that Act,” and that it, on the recommendation of the Minister of Canadian Heritage, “declines to refer…
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Quebecor announced Monday the western Canada beta launch of Videotron’s discount wireless brand Fizz has been expanded to include Victoria and Abbotsford.
Last month, the fully digital wireless brand announced its beta launch in Vancouver, Calgary and Edmonton.
“True to Fizz’s DNA of thinking outside the box, testing and innovating, this beta launch is the first step in a gradual expansion into other Canadian markets over the coming months,” reads a Fizz press release. “By being the first to experience it, the beta testers will help Fizz fine-tune its product and…
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By Ahmad Hathout
The large telecommunications companies are urging the CRTC to turn away applications asking it to require a pre-production test environment for next generation 911 calls, saying it is unnecessary and too costly.
Some public safety answering points (PSAPs) and the government of British Columbia filed separate Part 1 applications with the regulator asking for it to mandate the ability of these emergency entities to hook up to a pre-production test environment for NG911 so that real 911 calls are not at risk when testing software updates and new features. The NG911 networks are expected to carry multimedia, such…
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