TORONTO – A weak TV advertising market weighed down first quarter results at Corus Entertainment.
The company said Wednesday that net income attributable to shareholders for the quarter ended November 30, 2017 was $77.7 million, up from $71.1 million in the same period last year, which includes business acquisition, integration and restructuring costs of $1.6 million. Adjusting for the impact of this item resulted in an adjusted net income attributable to shareholders of $78.9 million this quarter.
Consolidated revenues for the quarter were $457.4 million, down 2% from $468.0 million last year, and consolidated segment profit was $177.9 million, down 7%…
Continue Reading
I WAS NOT SURPRISED to learn that one of Jim Shaw’s role models was former U.K. Prime Minister Winston Churchill.
In his time, Churchill was considered a political outsider, a brash maverick, seemingly unwavering in his convictions, fiercely loyal to his homeland and someone who inspired similar loyalty in so many others. Along the way of course, Churchill was exactly what his country needed at the time and he found enormous successes – but his sometimes irascible nature also antagonized more than a few.
For those of us who have been in the cable industry for a while, there are many…
Continue Reading
A hard-nosed businessman, he made a brilliant cable territory swap, competed ferociously with Telus and pulled Global television from the Canwest inferno
FEW OCCASIONS BETTER illustrated the cultural divide between the world of the western bottom-up entrepreneur and that of Ottawa’s top-down public service bureaucracy than when Jim Shaw and Konrad von Finckenstein crossed swords in a hearing room.
There, front and centre of the raised platform bearing commissioners, would be the multilingual von Finckenstein, a six-foot-something-awesome lawyer who was chief legal adviser on the original North American Free Trade negotiations, served as head of the Competition Bureau, became a Federal…
Continue Reading
CALGARY – Shaw Communications vice chair and former CEO Jim Shaw has died at the age of 60, the Shaw family announced today.
“It is with great sadness that the family of James R. Shaw (Jim Shaw) announces his passing on Wednesday, January 3rd, 2018 after a brief illness,” reads a statement from the family.
“A leader and visionary who never stopped caring for others,” says the statement, Jim is survived by his wife Kathryn, his mother Carol, his father JR, his children Haley (Fred), Parker (Megan), Kennedy, Kathryn’s children Monty, Katelyn, Carly, his mother-in-law Janet, his sisters Heather (Jim) and…
Continue Reading
TORONTO – Shawn Praskey last month departed Corus Entertainment for Disney.
Praskey (pictured) joined Corus in 2008 as marketing manager, joining the company from the former Astral Media and progressed through the ranks. He was vice-president, content distribution for the past three years until his departure last month.
Praskey’s new role is vice president, head of content sales, Canada for Disney/ABC Home Entertainment and Television Distribution.
He now manages all Canadian sales across multiple broadcasters and platforms, licensing television programming and feature films from the Disney/ABC Television Group and The Walt Disney Studios.
Continue Reading
SEATTLE – Amazon Prime Video in late September first announced it had picked up the BBC and AMC crime drama McMafia for 200 territories, excluding the U.S. and Canada, where AMC was to air the eight-part crime drama.
However, Amazon on Thursday announced it will exclusively stream McMafia in Canada on its local Amazon Prime Video platform from January 2, a day after the world premiere on BBC in the UK.
McMafia, based on a best-selling non-fiction book, is a co-production involving the BBC, AMC Network and Cuba Pictures, and is distributed internationally by BBC Worldwide. A spokesperson for BBC Worldwide…
Continue Reading
CANADIAN CABLE SYSTEMS Alliance CEO Jay Thomson knows Canadian networks and media inside and out. How could he not? Before the CCSA, he worked for the Canadian Cable Television Association, the Canadian Association of Internet Providers, the Canadian Association of Broadcasters and the Canadian Media Producers Association (Telus and the CRTC, too).
The long-time Ottawa executive was hired as CEO of the CCSA in January 2017, replacing Alyson Townsend, who was let go in the summer of 2016. Thomson is steeped in the business and, as importantly, knows government – especially an Ottawa whose politicians and bureaucrats tend to be…
Continue Reading
LE PDG DE LA CANADIAN Cable Systems Alliance, Jay Thomson connaît les réseaux et les médias canadiens de fond en comble. Comment pourrait-il en être autrement ? Avant de travailler à la CCSA, il a travaillé à l’Association canadienne des télécommunications par câble (ACTC), Canadian Association of Internet Providers, l’Association canadienne des radiodiffuseurs et la Canadian Media Producers Association (également à Telus et au CRTC).
Ce dirigeant de longue date d’Ottawa a été embauché comme PDG de la CCSA en remplacement de Alyson Townsend qui a quitté son poste à l’été 2016. Thomson est à l’aise dans ce secteur et, de manière aussi…
Continue Reading
CALGARY – Shaw Communications has unveiled a new product to help business owners monitor and protect their businesses while also providing analytical insights.
SmartSurveillance is an enterprise-grade managed video surveillance solution that offers features such as motion search analytics in a selected area of interest, heat mapping analytics for motion data to help gain insights into customer behaviour, or a video wall that groups multiple video streams into one view that can be watched from anywhere with an Internet connection.
SmartSurveillance may be bundled with Shaw Business' managed WiFi and network security solutions SmartWiFi and SmartSecurity and maintained through one integrated dashboard. Professionally…
Continue Reading
Whatever the future of TV may hold
GATINEAU – The rise of online TV distribution platforms such as Netflix, Amazon Prime and others are upending the delicate balance of the Canadian broadcasting system and that means the federal government and the CRTC need to change the way they regulate the sector. In a nutshell, Canadian broadcasters, producers and distributors want these platforms treated the same way they are.
In comments to the CRTC’s consultation on new TV program distribution models (which was requested by the federal government ostensibly as the first step towards modernizing the Broadcasting Act and Telecom Act), many…
Continue Reading
