Search Results for: rogers

Cable / Telecom News, Radio / Television News

Rogers puts a 10-year leg-lock on WWE

TORONTO – Rogers Communications and WWE today announced a 10-year broadcast and multimedia agreement, making Rogers the exclusive distributor of WWE's flagship programming in Canada through 2024. Financial terms were not disclosed but the deal extends WWE's current programming on Sportsnet 360 (formerly The Score) and includes the right to distribute WWE Network as a premium linear channel, with a preview beginning August 12, according to the press release. Rogers will be the exclusive distribution partner of all WWE pay-per-view events throughout Canada and will sponsor an application to the CRTC to bring the popular WWE Network to Canada as a… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News

New partner means wireless coverage expansion for Eastlink

HALIFAX – Eastlink Wireless customers can talk, surf and text in more places down east than ever before, thanks to a “unique network partner approach to supplement its own network coverage,” the company announced Thursday afternoon. The Bragg family-owned cable and wireless company says that its customers now have the most coverage of any carrier in Atlantic Canada (see map, pictured). “We’re unable to name the partner we have added and we have excellent coverage here in Atlantic Canada but there were places – whether it was a cottage or a golf course or so on where customers might have been… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News, Investigates, Radio / Television News

LET’S TALK TV: The CRTC must act to save local television

GATINEAU – Local TV is struggling mightily. Ad revenue is down and showing no signs of growth, while the ever growing lineup of new specialty channels and the rapid rise of Internet-based alternatives are blasting away at what has always been the bedrock of the television system in Canada. Some are telling the CRTC that it’s time to adopt a radically different approach for local TV, one that would bolster the revenue side of the ledger while also helping to encourage the development of compelling Canadian content. For example, Bell Canada and CBC/Radio-Canada suggest shutting down over the air infrastructure completely… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News

SPECTRUM: Feds open up AWS-3 auction consult

OTTAWA – With a healthy set-aside for operating newcomers (read: wireless companies which are serving Canadians and who aren’t Rogers, Bell or Telus), the federal government opened its public consultation on the AWS-3 auction it plans to hold in March of 2015 – one month prior to the long-planned 2500 MHz auction. AWS-3 spectrum is in the 1755-1780 and 2155-2180 MHz bands and 30 of the 50 MHz on offer will be solely for the likes of Videotron, Wind, EastLink, and Mobilicity (or whomever is left standing in eight months…). In order to be eligible to bid on the set-aside,… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News

Rogers and Glentel renew retail deal

TORONTO and BURNABY, B.C. – Rogers Communications and Glentel today announced Monday they will extend their multi-year agreement for the retailer to offer Rogers products and services in Glentel's 485 retail locations across Canada, such as WIRELESSWAVE, Tbooth wireless, WIRELESS etc., Target Mobile and others. "With Glentel stores in every part of the country, Rogers products and services will continue to be available to people wherever they shop, from department stores to plazas and all the key shopping malls,” said Rob Bruce, president of Rogers Communications' consumer business unit. "For more than 25 years, Rogers has contributed to Glentel's significant profitable… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News, Radio / Television News

Rogers CEO Laurence has no comment on the Loch Ness Monster while discussing company’s Q2

TORONTO – Though he was just coming off an announcement of hundreds of management layoffs, and numbers showing a 24% drop in net income, fewer cable TV subscribers and flat revenue, Rogers CEO Guy Laurence put an optimistic face on his company’s financial outlook on Thursday. Wireless, by far the biggest contributor to Rogers’s bottom line, saw a 1% drop in revenue, which the company attributed largely to its new simplified plans (bundling in fees like voicemail and caller ID) and changes like lower-priced roaming plans (as it did three months ago). But the drop in… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News

Cable, media pull down Q2 profits at Rogers

TORONTO – Rogers’ second quarter profits fell 24% while revenues for the period were virtually unchanged from last year, the company announced Thursday. For the quarter ended June 30, 2014, Rogers posted consolidated net income of $405 million, well below $532 million in the same period last year, on operating revenue of $3.21 billion, which was flat from the second quarter of 2013.  Adjusted net income was $432 million, a 13% drop from $497 million last year. Rogers said that Wireless network revenue of $1.8 billion dipped 1% year-over-year due in part to the less expensive roaming plans introduced over the past… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News, Investigates, Radio / Television News

LET’S TALK TV: “Irrational bidding” for sports rights drives up costs, limits consumer choice, says Telus and others

GATINEAU – It will surprise no one that the cost of sports television are front and centre for so many of the submissions to the CRTC’s TV Policy Review Telus, for example, called the amount of cash being sent to various leagues and teams for the rights to live games “irrational” and has requested the CRTC address the soaring price of sports services and eliminate penetration-based rate cards in sports packaging. Lined up on the side of Telus, are Shaw Communications, Cogeco and Canadian Cable Systems Alliance members, distributors who own no sports channels. While vertically integrated companies like Rogers and… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News, General, Radio / Television News

Rogers cuts “several hundred” from middle management ranks

TORONTO – CEO Guy Laurence continues his work of “untangling the spaghetti” that is Rogers Communications.  The company announced “several hundred” middle managers and some vice-presidents were let go Monday as part of the work of rebuilding the company’s customer service image and making it work more efficiently. In late May, Laurence laid out a new plan for the company – calling it Rogers 3.0 – and noted then that job cuts would be in the offing once the new corporate structure, (also announced in May), began to reform the company and… Continue Reading

Cable / Telecom News, Radio / Television News

Rogers modifies customer data request policy

TORONTO – After its first ever Transparency Report revealed that it received nearly 175,000 requests for customer data from federal agencies in 2013, Rogers said Wednesday that it is changing the way that it shares its customers’ private information and will require a court order before giving any information to the police or other government investigators. In a post on its official blog RedBoard, Rogers said that the change comes in response to customer concerns and after further review of a Supreme Court ruling from last month. (Both Telus and TekSavvy have already said they will now require court… Continue Reading