GATINEAU – Just like fictional detective John McClane has always been the wrong man in the wrong place at the wrong time, Canadian Association of Broadcasters president and CEO Glenn O’Farrell had a similar way of describing the two over-the-air high definition license applicants on Tuesday:
“Put simply, we believe these are the wrong applications, for the wrong licences, at the wrong time,” he said.
HDTV Networks is a bid for a national over-the-air broadcast network with transmitters in Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal and Halifax. YES TV is a license request for a Toronto-only high…
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TORONTO – The last remaining Toronto independent cable holdout has decided to sell to the big red machine.
Rogers Cable announced this afternoon that it has entered into an agreement to acquire Aurora Cable, subject to CRTC approval. Aurora Cable provides cable television, Internet and telephony services in the Town of Aurora and the community of Oak Ridges, in Richmond Hill, Ontario.
(Ed Note: While the purchase price was not release by either company, Aurora serves approximately 16,000 customers, offering cable, digital cable, high speed Internet and voice in a wealthy demographic. Using a conservative guesstimate of $2500 per subscriber,…
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TORONTO – While the digital transition is not coming to Canada until 2011, we have the benefit of learning from how the U.S. cable operators and programmers will manage and are managing this consumer impacting event.
“Join this teleseminar to learn the strategies and the tactics being planned by our friends to the South,” says CTAM Canada.
What does the digital transition mean for cable companies, content providers and consumers? Find out by coming to one of five locations across Canada which will show the CTAM Teleconference.
The speakers are: Sam Howe, Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer,…
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TORONTO – Sarah Tirkalas of London, Ont. is Rogers Cable’s millionth Home Phone customer, the company announced this morning.
"Rogers Home Phone has seen record-breaking growth in just over two-and-a-half years since launching the service," said Phil Hartling, vice-president of consumer services for Rogers Cable, in a release.
As a token of appreciation for her business, Tirkalas will receive a pair of court side tickets to a Raptors game and during the game, she will have a chance to shoot for prizes. She will also receive Rogers Home Phone service at no charge for one year.
"I already had…
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DARTMOUTH – Supplier Arcom has announced Lotha James is now territory manager of sales – central and western Canada
James “brings a wealth of knowledge in the wireless and CATV markets and will nicely complement our depth in the telecom and enterprise networks markets. He will work closely with our regional managers, located in Ottawa and Vancouver to expand our service and product offerings in his territory,” says the Arcom release.
James began his career in the telecommunications industry in 1979 with Rogers Cable. After ten years as primarily a headend technician he ventured into the supplier distribution side…
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GATINEAU – “The CTF is gratified that the great majority of interveners strongly support the Canadian Television Fund and emphasize that one of the Fund’s greatest strengths is its adaptability to new challenges faced by the industry,” said Douglas Barrett, chairman of the board of the Canadian Television Fund, in closing the week-long hearing on the future of the fund today.
“When considering changes to the industry’s funding system, the most critical objective is ensuring that, given that the competing demands of stakeholders in the production, broadcast, and distribution system, the interests of the Canadian public, including both taxpayers…
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SAN ANTONIO, TX – AT&T will cast a wider net for mobile customers this year by building out its network to make catching a high speed wireless web connection easier coast-to-coast.
The big telco today announced highlights of the company’s 2008 wireless network expansion plans, including the deployment of third-generation (3G) wireless broadband service to more than 80 additional cities in the United States through the course of the year.
The planned expansion is expected to deliver GSM provider AT&T 3G services to nearly 350 leading U.S. markets by the end of 2008, including all of the top 100…
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WINNIPEG – MTS announced Tuesday that it had achieved its 2007 revenue guidance, hit the high end of predicted EBITDA and free cash flow guidance, and exceeded its earnings per share guidance for the fiscal year 2007, ended December 31.
In 2007, growth services (wireless, Internet, TV, unified communications) revenues increased by 12.6%, and EPS from continuing operations increased by 15.6%.
"These results underline how 2007 marked a turning point for MTS. With the successful execution of the strategy we developed in 2006, we have proven that we can meet the competitive challenges of our industry and we are…
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GATINEAU – The Canadian Television Fund should be split in two: one with public money to meet government policy objectives, and the other with private money to support hit shows, Rogers Communications told the CRTC on Tuesday morning.
During day two of the week-long hearing into the CTF’s revenue and governance models, executives told commissioners that increasingly the CTF—originally the Cable Production Fund supported entirely by the cable industry—“is viewed as a public policy instrument for the Canadian government” instead of a way to encourage broadcasters to air popular shows, said Rogers’ Vice Chairman Phil Lind.
To qualify for…
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TORONTO – Beginning today, The Score will provide sports updates to broadcaster Global News Ontario.
The Score’s daily sports coverage will be seen during Global’s 6 a.m. Morning News, Noon News, 6 p.m. News Hour, and 11 p.m. News Final.
The sports channel’s updates replace those of Rogers Sportsnet, which supplied sports updates for Global previously. But with Rogers now owning Global Television competitor Citytv, that supply deal couldn’t continue.
Global outsourced its sports coverage to Sportsnet after firing nearly all of its sports staff in 2006.
“The Score’s sports coverage will bring the Global News Ontario…
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