MONTREAL – Growth in both its television and publishing division helped to drive up 2013 profits at TVA Group.
For the fiscal year ended December 31, 2013, consolidated adjusted operating income was $60.6 million, up from $42.5 million in 2012, due to a 42.6% increase from the television segment ($14.5 million) and the publishing segment ($3.6 million).
The Quebecor–owned communications company said its TV increases are attributable to the exclusion of Sun News’ results, which have not been consolidated since July 2012, recognition of retroactive royalties for distant signal retransmission, and the implementation of an expense reduction plan, which offset decreases in…
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OTTAWA – Industry Canada has blocked a request by NextWave to transfer 83 spectrum licences to Rogers and Bell-owned Inukshuk, citing competitive concerns.
Industry Minister James Moore issued the decision Thursday, saying that after considering this request under the new spectrum licence transfer framework, Industry Canada determined that this licence transfer would “lead to unacceptable levels of concentration of spectrum in the hands of incumbent carriers that negatively affects competition in our wireless sector”.
“We will not approve any spectrum transfer request that results in excessive spectrum concentration for Canada's largest wireless companies, which negatively affects competition in the telecommunications sector”,…
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TORONTO – Shaw Media launched the new History Go app Thursday, just in time for season two of the hit series Vikings which airs Thursdays at 10:00 PM ET/PT, beginning February 27.
Available on iOS, Android, and history.ca, History Go offers History subscribers almost 300 hours of programming, including season one of Vikings, and popular series Yukon Gold, Ice Pilots NWT and Pawn Stars. The app is available now with Shaw, Shaw Direct, Rogers and several CCSA distributors, and will be available to Telus Optik TV and Cogeco Cable Canada subscribers next month.
“History Go is a strong addition to Shaw’s…
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CALGARY and TORONTO – Rogers has opened the first Tier III certified data centre in Alberta, offering Canadian and international businesses a highly reliable and certified data centre presence in Western Canada.
The facility, called Calgary_DC3, is Rogers Data Centre's second Tier III centre in Canada and is in close enough proximity to Calgary city limits to be used as a primary corporate data centre for that market, and far enough out to be used as a disaster recovery site. The 85,000 square foot facility provides access to both raised floor and business resumption space, with capacity for over 900 cabinets,…
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OTTAWA – The Ontario Superior Court of Justice has ordered Rogers Communications to pay an administrative monetary penalty of $500,000 as part of a suit between the wireless company and the Competition Bureau over misleading advertising.
As Cartt.ca readers will recall, the Bureau launched legal proceedings against Rogers in 2010 claiming that its ads for its new low cost flanker brand Chatr made misleading claims about dropped calls, and that those claims were not based on adequate and proper tests. But the court eventually sided with Rogers and threw out the Bureau’s petition.
This week, the Court rejected Rogers’…
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OTTAWA – Let’s get this out of the way right now… Most of us were wrong. Many had assumed we would have a nice orderly, low-priced auction once there were no wild cards left in the bidding.
Analysts and other observers (us, too) made the mistake in thinking that these ultra-competitive companies would somehow quietly and quickly divvy up spectrum which boasts such excellent distance and barrier-penetrating properties as yet unseen in wireless telephony in Canada, spending only perhaps half of what was spent in the last auction – the $4.2 billion for AWS spectrum in 2008.
Not. Even. Close. Rogers…
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OTTAWA and MONTREAL – Cogeco Cable Canada has been named Company of the Year by Women in Communications and Technology, (formerly known as Canadian Women in Communications), for 2013.
"The role of women in the organization is of the greatest importance to us here at Cogeco," said Cogeco Cable Canada president and CEO Louise St-Pierre, in a statement. “We firmly believe that our strengths lie, among other things, in our ability to attract the very best talent. The fact that women occupy so many senior executive positions at Cogeco is a clear indication of their significant contributions to the company's…
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OTTAWA – Quebecor doesn't mince words in its complaint against the Bell Broadcast and New Media Fund: "The decisions made by the board of directors of the Bell Fund in regard to three projects submitted in 2013 and set to be broadcast on TVA channels were not made in an objective manner and were discriminatory against TVA."
In a letter to the CRTC dated February 5 and made public on Monday, Quebecor's regulatory affairs director Peggy Tabet argues that the fund's decisions to refuse the three projects were made for "non-justified reasons" and concludes that they were made in a…
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OTTAWA – The Canadian government got its wish for four wireless carriers in each region of the country in its recently completed 700 Mhz spectrum auction, which netted federal coffers $5.27 billion.
Overall, the results of the auction show that it was the Big Three that divvied up the majority of the spectrum even though they were limited on buying prime spectrum in the B, C, C1 and C2 blocks. While Rogers Communications focused on the prime B band and the A block, Bell Canada and Telus licence purchases appeared to complement each other in the C2 and the unpaired…
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TORONTO – Rogers is offering customers the option to upgrade their smartphones every 12 months through a soon-to-be-launched program known as Rogers Next.
The early upgrade program waives the early upgrade and connection fees, and allows subscribers to choose any smartphone worth up to $250 based on two-year term subsidized pricing. If the two-year term subsidized price for the chosen device exceeds $250, customers may pay the difference in the hardware price.
Rogers Next, which will be available soon for new and existing customers, will cost $24.99 per month or $29.99 per month if the customer opts to include the company’s…
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