TORONTO – The rumour mill in the TV business was spinning overtime on this one lately, but today Rogers Communications made it official – it is killing its long-awaited IPTV solution in favour of Comcast’s X1 platform.
The move means the company will take a pre-tax non-cash asset impairment charge in the range of C$475-$525 million in its fourth quarter.
Friday morning’s press saw Rogers tout a new “long-term strategic partnership” with Comcast to bring Rogers customers Comcast's X1 IP-based video platform. However, it will not launch until 2018.
As we have reported, Rogers was hoping to have its IPTV solution (built…
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TORONTO — Bloomberg TV Canada’s first year of operation has been one of growth and expansion, with distribution and advertising levels increasing monthly, the first of several news bureaus across the country coming online, and an “A-list” of newsmakers having appeared on the channel.
Despite not having carriage on Bell TV nor Bell Fibe, Bloomberg TV Canada executives say it has achieved distribution parity with its main business channel competitor, Bell-owned Business News Network (BNN). “We’re very happy, 12 months in, with the progress that we’ve made and the expansion that we’ve seen,” said Chris Fuoco, vice-president of sales and…
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TORONTO – Amazon Web Services (AWS) has been setting up data centres around the world offering a wide range of compute and analytics services in competition and partnership with local service providers and on Thursday it announced it has come to Canada, opening two data centres here – as promised earlier in the year .
Now it’s looking to partner with telecommunications firms to resell its services.
“If you look around the world there are many telco partners who work with us closely to take our services to market and offer complimentary services to the AWS platform,” AWS Canada director Eric…
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New TV specialty is serious about music
TORONTO — Launched in October as a place for “serious music fans”, the retro-focused Vintage TV Canada specialty channel is aimed at not only older music lovers but anyone who’s hungry for music information and good solid music, says Canadian radio veteran Alan Cross, the channel’s creative director.
In contrast to other music channels where celebrities and lifestyle programming figure prominently and music now takes a back seat, Vintage TV Canada is focused on artists making serious music (its logo is a guitar pick), Cross said last week in an interview with Cartt.ca. We…
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TORONTO – Part social powwow and part professional revelation, the annual CTAM Canada Broadcaster Forum unspooled a ribbon of timely data points and commentary on new technology trends, a VR state-of-the-nation and even reflections on CBC’s unsullied broadcast of Tragically Hip’s summer concert.
Technology and television Innovation
A quartet of industry experts—Tom Elam, VP and GM with TiVo’s service provider business; Jay Gardner, VP of product development with Shaw; Joel Orvis, director of TV product management with Bell Canada; and Matt Nelson, director of strategic alliances with You.i—unpacked the latest developments in television tech on a panel moderated by Norm…
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REGINA – Access Communications has signed a three-year broadcast agreement with the Western Hockey League (WHL) to provide local hockey coverage throughout Saskatchewan.
In partnership with the WHL’s regional community cable broadcast partner Shaw Communications, community channel Access7 will air a minimum 40 WHL regular season games in the 2016-17 season, of which at least 10 will feature the Regina Pats. In addition, broadcasted games will feature all six of the WHL’s East Division teams including all five Saskatchewan-based clubs.
Games will be available on Access channels 7 or 70 (depending on the community), says the company.
“As a 100% community-owned company,…
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TORONTO – Hollywood Suite is marking its 5th birthday with a five-week national free preview promising more than 500 movies.
Just in time for the holidays, viewers can enjoy the gift of the best movies from the 70s, 80s, 90s, and 2000s, uncut and commercial-free, on four HDTV channels and On Demand. December titles include the director’s cut of Bad Santa, plus films like 12 Years a Slave, Titanic, The Expendables, The Interview, Raising Arizona, 48 Hours, Beverly Hills Cop, Edward Scissorhands, Sleepy Hollow, Fatal Attraction, American Beauty, Jerry Maguire, and Moneyball.
The freeview is available now through January 5, 2107…
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Netflix, et al, changing the market
GATINEAU – The tipping point is coming.
That was part of the message delivered to the CRTC by Bell Media during its appearance before the CRTC for the company’s group license renewal. Thanks to new content buyers with global reach and enormous purchasing power, securing the rights to foreign content for Canada is getting ever-more expensive.
“Last May, we were in Los Angeles buying our foreign television content,” said Bell Media president Mary Ann Turcke to the commission panel. “There were three shows that we were bidding on and Netflix was the competitor – a competitor…
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TORONTO — Since launching five years ago with 11 full-time employees, under the leadership of Canadian TV industry veterans Jay Switzer and David Kines, commercial-free movie service Hollywood Suite has slowly but surely been growing.
After rejigging its original studio-focused channels a year ago and rebranding them as a quartet of decades-focused channels in anticipation of the rollout of the pick-and-pay regime, company executives believe the company is well positioned for the new market reality of a la carte TV channel choice.
Despite continuing to be small in stature, now employing 14, Hollywood Suite’s success shouldn’t come as too…
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GATINEAU – The demise of Shomi has raised a number of questions regarding the future of domestic streaming services in the face of competition from global competitors such as Netflix, including some from CRTC chairman Jean-Pierre Blais today. But for Rogers Media, it means that partnering with global giants might be the best approach going forward.
Rick Brace, president at Rogers Media, noted during the company’s appearance before the CRTC’s major English language broadcasters licence renewal hearing, that while shomi was a response to Netflix, it quickly became apparent that the cost to acquire programming was escalating quickly and the…
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