NEW ORLEANS – The technical leaders of the North American cable industry gathered in room 211 at the Ernest Morial Convention Center in New Orleans today to give one of the industry’s true engineering pioneers a retirement send-off.
Rogers Communications Nick Hamilton-Piercy is officially retiring after over a half-century in cable and telecommunications, most of that with Rogers. “I was hoping just to slip off unnoticed,” he said this afternoon, visibly surprised by the planned get-together put together by NCTA staff.
Hamilton-Piercy has been one of the titans of the technical and engineering side of the cable industry, notably…
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TORONTO – Over 20 industry leaders will deliver keynotes at the 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit, running from June 16 to 18 at the Toronto Congress Centre, organizers announced Tuesday.
They will give their insights into the future of Canadian telecommunications industry, while examining technology, services, consumer and business trends and policy. More than 50 experts will be participating in panel discussions.
One of the highlights of Monday’s sessions, according to organizers, is the panel on examining entertainment and content over broadband. It will feature a discussion by Gary Anderson (VP Consumer Internet Services, Sympatico MSN), Steve Billinger (Executive Director, Digital Programming and…
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TORONTO – Rogers Sportsnet’s new studio won the Award of Excellence in the engineering category at the 18th annual Steel Design Awards sponsored by the Ontario region of the Canadian Institute of Steel Construction.
The award was for the new studio’s column-removal project, which involved designing and installing a pair of 30,000-ton steel trusses that spanned 18 metres, and removing a central column at the ground-floor of the Isabella Tower, a 12-storey structure on the Rogers campus.
Sportsnet and Halsall Associates Limited, the consultants and structural engineers behind the project, received the award.
“The column removal was truly an…
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TORONTO – The two Canadian sports network titans are finally apart.
For over seven years, Rogers Sportsnet and TSN, the top two sports channels in Canada, were cheek to cheek at 9 Channel Nine Court in Agincourt in North Toronto. The situation was a legacy of Sportsnet’s launch in 1998 as CTV Sportsnet. At that time, it was a state-of-the-art studio within the CTV complex.
But when CTV bought TSN, moving it into the same CTV campus and sold its majority interest in Sportsnet to Rogers in 2001, the regional sports network stayed put. It was a little unusual,…
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TORONTO – The Ontario Superior Court of Justice this month dismissed a claim requiring the Inukshuk Wireless Partnership (Rogers and Bell) to return MCS spectrum to a subsidiary of Rogers.
UBS Wireless Services Inc. subsidiary Unique Broadband Systems Inc. started litigation against Allstream and Rogers subsidiary Microcell and two of its subsidiaries, including Inukshuk Internet Inc., in April 2004. UBS alleges that there were breaches of contract, confidence and fiduciary duties regarding a signed agreement involving the MCS spectrum.
After Rogers and Bell asked Industry Canada to transfer the MCS spectrum out of the companies being litigated against and…
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TORONTO – Women in Film and Television-Toronto (WIFT-T) on Wednesday announced four new members were added to its 2008 Board of Directors: Gaye McDonald (Vice-President of Brand Partnerships at Canwest), Kara Russell (Associate, Hall Webber LLP Entertainment and New Media Law), Akhaji Zakiya (Senior Consultant at Nordicity Group Ltd.) and Madeline Ziniak (National Vice-President at Rogers OMNI Television).
Re-elected returning board members are Gabriella Martinelli (President and CEO of Capri Films) and Susan Ross (Executive Vice-President and General Manager of Specialty Television at Corus Entertainment).
Continuing their terms on the board are Wanda Bradley (Director of Sales/Operations at NBC…
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TORONTO – Rogers Wireless Inc. is the first North American carrier to launch Yahoo! oneSearch, a mobile search service, it was announced Tuesday. The application is being offered to Rogers’ Wireless and Fido customers across Canada.
The product release is an expansion of a multi-year mobile, broadband and PC search agreement reached late last year between Rogers Communications and Yahoo!.
“Yahoo!’s revolutionary mobile search service provides our customers easy and instant access to the latest and greatest Rogers content and all the relevant results and instant answers to the information they care about anytime and anywhere,” said Rogers Wireless SVP and…
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“IN A DIGITAL CONTENT world, all stakeholders must accept greater risk,” is a single line from the final reply to the CRTC by Telus to the Commission’s policy review of broadcast distribution undertakings and specialty services.
Final replies from stakeholders were due into the Commission last Thursday.
It’s a key line, because it lies at the heart of what’s at stake for every media company in Canada – heck, in the western world, really, and certainly for Canadian specialty channels, OTA broadcasters and BDUs. With the digital media world comes new opportunities, but also more risk than the tried…
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GATINEAU – When rookie CRTC commissioner Michel Morin first unveiled his possible points plan for specialty channels during last month’s BDU and specialty policy hearing, many were left scratching their heads.
But, as he put more meat on the bones of his idea, as it were, as the hearing progressed, stakeholders began to mull it over and some were taking it pretty seriously. In fact, the Commission asked for comments from stakeholders to address it specifically.
However, upon further review, most have lauded Morin’s intentions – more Canadian content to more Canadians – but dismissed his idea.
Morin proposed…
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TORONTO – Rogers OMNI Television announced Monday two firsts in diversity TV in Canada – the start of its exclusive multilingual coverage of this summer’s UEFA European Football Championship and the launch of digital over-the-air transmissions for Toronto viewers of OMNI.1 and OMNI.2.
Coverage of the UEFA European Football Championship begins June 7 at noon Eastern Time with the live, tri-lingual coverage of the competition’s first match, between Switzerland and the Czech Republic on OMNI.1 (in Italian) and on OMNI.2 (in Cantonese and Mandarin).
“Rogers OMNI Television once again leads the way, now building on our reputation for covering…
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