BANFF – CRTC chairman Konrad von Finckenstein is one busy guy these days – just ask him. “We have a hearing virtually every month which is unheard of”, he told Cartt.ca on Monday morning at the Banff World Festival.
A few of the biggest broadcast-related issues on his plate at the moment – the pending digital transition and the impact that the over-the-top services are having in Canada – figured prominently in his annual breakfast speech to delegates here on the confab’s first full day.
Congratulating the country’s TV broadcasters on their efforts to date to comply with August 31st deadline,…
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WOODSTOCK, NB – Xplornet Communications has acquired more than 1,300 satellite broadband subscribers predominantly in Alberta and B.C. from NetKaster, a division of Northwestel, the companies announced Friday. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
These subscribers will migrate over to Xplornet’s network and packages starting in July.
“This kind of acquisition speaks to our aggressive growth model and follows on other similarly successful acquisitions”, said Xplornet CEO John Maduri, in the announcement. “More importantly, these new Xplornet subscribers will see the benefits of Xplornet’s 24/7 customer service, our coast to coast dealer network and constantly upgraded network. We look…
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OTTAWA – Bell’s decision to repackage Canadian specialty channel The Cave while continuing to distribute its own like-minded service and a comparable foreign service smacks of undue preference and disadvantage, the CRTC ruled Friday.
The Cave (formerly known as Men TV) is a category 1 specialty service controlled by Quebecor’s TVA Group and licensed to Shaw Television. Quebecor filed a complaint with the Commission last December over Bell’s decision to repackage it from the ‘Lifestyle 2’ package, where it had been for the past eight years, to the ‘Variety 3’ package, alleging an undue disadvantage and an undue preference…
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TORONTO – Telus customers will soon be able to use Skype on their smart phones and purchase Skype credits through their Telus accounts. In addition, Telus will launch the first Skype edition smart phone in Canada, the LG Optimus Black, the companies announced Thursday.
Skype is a software application that allows users to make low cost voice and video calls and chats over the Internet. With 663 million registered users as of 2010, the company was acquired by Microsoft for US$8.5 billion last month.
Telus said that its partnership with Skype will allow customers to make unlimited Skype-to-Skype voice calls and instant…
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HALIFAX – Global Maritimes is bringing back Ron Kronstein as its new senior anchor as it overhauls its evening news programs.
Kronstein will host both the New Brunswick Evening News and the Nova Scotia Evening News, which make their debut on June 13 at 6pm AT. Reporter Marie Adsett will move to the anchor chair to helm Global Maritimes’ hour-long News Final program at 11pm weeknights, while anchor/reporter Rebecca Lau will take over responsibility as anchor of the Weekend News while continuing to report during the week.
A veteran reporter, producer and anchor, Kronstein has more than 25 years of television experience,…
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OTTAWA – The CRTC is asking for comments on a proposed code of best practices for access programming on cable community channels.
The code, available here, was submitted by the Cable Industry Working Group which was assembled last August and includes representative from Rogers, Shaw, Cogeco, EastLink, Quebecor and the CCSA.
The deadline for submitting comments is September 6, and replies are due by September 16, 2011.
www.crtc.gc.ca
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TORONTO – Making a passionate case for greater government support of wireless competition, Globalive Group Chairman Anthony Lacavera lambasted the nation’s three incumbent mobile providers, called for a full set-aside of 700 MHz spectrum for newer entrants and urged that the government ease its current restrictions on foreign investment in Canadian telecom providers.
In a wide-ranging keynote at the Canadian Telecom Summit here Thursday morning, Lacavera lit into Rogers Communications, Bell Canada and Telus for raising legal and regulatory challenges to Globalive’s entry into the Canadian market because of its international investors (wireless giant Orascom). Further, he knocked Rogers,…
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TORONTO – It was no surprise when the last member of the Canadian wireless triumvirate to address this week’s Canadian Telecom Summit made his pitch for an open auction the next time wireless spectrum goes on the block.
As George Cope, president and CEO of BCE and Bell Canada, put it during his luncheon keynote address on the final day of the Telecom Summit: why would the Canadian government put a spectrum auction process in place that would prevent one of the big three incumbent wireless carriers from participating fully in the 700MHz spectrum auction (expected in late 2012)?…
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Dear Greg,
MY COMPLIMENTS ON YOUR superb coverage of the 2011 Canadian Telecom Summit. I was hoping to grab a chance to speak while we were there, but we didn’t seem to cross paths. Maybe next time.
Regarding this article (CTS 2011: Don’t punish us for being early, good, says Telus’ McFarlane), I noted the following Editor’s Comment which I think it is important to correct:
"(Ed note: However, if Industry Canada likes Videotron’s other idea – to consider the HSPA network-sharing Telus and Bell, or “Belus” as Videotron CEO Robert Dépatie called them Wednesday – as a single entity, neither…
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TORONTO – It’s a message the entrenched telecom incumbents have been hammering home all three days of the 2011 Canadian Telecom Summit: Don’t hate us because we’re beautiful.
Okay, maybe “beautiful” is kind of a stretch, but executives from Bell Canada, Rogers and Telus are dying to make it clear to anyone who’ll listen that while they do have millions of subscribers and excellent profits, they have also been the ones who have taken most of the risks on wireless and other telecom investment in Canada – so how can that mean rules have to be built (like those to…
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