Regional carriers acknowledge opportunity exists, though
By Greg O’Brien
TORONTO – It was heartening to hear from a handful of the top Canadian telecom executives on Wednesday when they detailed how their companies have, admirably, responded to the Covid-19 crisis.
Suspensions of overage fees, no disconnects, working with businesses and consumers to defer payments or re-do packages to help as they struggle financially, serious progress on remote health (especially by Telus), self-installs, employees working from home, networks which have remained robust and resilient, and charitable contributions too numerous to count, it has been an 11-week stretch like none of us have ever…
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VANCOUVER — After a B.C. Supreme Court ruling earlier today that said extradition proceedings against Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou can continue, Huawei Canada issued a statement regarding the case this afternoon.
“Huawei is disappointed in the ruling today by the Supreme Court of British Columbia. We have repeatedly expressed confidence in Ms. Meng’s innocence. Huawei continues to stand with Ms. Meng in her pursuit for justice and freedom,” reads the statement.
Meng is the chief financial officer of the Chinese telecom equipment manufacturer and is facing fraud charges in the United States, which has requested her extradition from Canada. The…
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VANCOUVER — The Telus Friendly Future Foundation is making a $200,000 donation to the Children’s Aid Foundation of Canada to help support its Covid-19 Crisis Support Fund.
More than 93% of former youth from care of the child welfare system who applied last month to the Children’s Aid Foundation’s Covid-19 Crisis Support Fund sought emergency assistance to pay for food and housing, according to the news release.
This contribution builds on Telus’ ongoing partnership with the Children’s Aid Foundation of Canada through the Telus Mobility for Good program, which provides free smartphones and data plans for two years to young…
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By Denis Carmel
MONTREAL – In a motion filed on June 23, 2017, Rovi/Tivo accused Videotron of patent infringement on components inside set-top boxes which Videotron uses to provide programming to its subscribers.
The U.S. company, called Rovi until it purchased TiVo and changed its name in 2017 also filed similar claims against BCE on January 19, 2018, and Telus on February 2, 2018. The Videotron portion of the trial commenced on March 9, 2020, and was adjourned after four days, in light of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The BCE and Telus portions had been scheduled for May 25th and were also pushed…
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OTTAWA — A recent Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association survey compiling data from some of Canada’s telecom providers released today gives insight into just how much Canadians’ consumption of telecom services has changed during the current health crisis, and that the country’s networks remained resilient in the face of all the traffic shifts and increases.
The CWTA collected information regarding wireline and mobile traffic, for broadband and voice, and measured it against a pre-Covid-19 baseline. Facilities-based network operators who were surveyed for the report include Bell, Rogers, SaskTel, Shaw/Freedom, Tbaytel, Telus and Videotron.
Among the data highlights of the CWTA’s report, Managing…
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LONDON, U.K. — Rural mobile subscribers in Canada enjoy some of the fastest download speeds in the world, says the latest report from mobile analytics company Opensignal.
Released today, The state of rural Canada’s Mobile Network Experience – May 2020 report also found rural mobile subscribers have access to 4G networks close to 90% of the time — a percentage more commonly seen by mobile users in more populated areas, Opensignal says.
For this report, Opensignal analyzed the data of users on Canada’s three largest mobile operators — Telus, Bell Mobility and Rogers. According to its analysis, rural users on the…
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By Ahmad Hathout
EDMONTON – A Calgary bylaw that sought to regulate the relationship between private entities and the city for access to municipal rights-of-way is not binding on telecom companies, the Alberta Court of Appeal said Thursday.
The highest court in the province upheld, 2-1, a lower court’s determination that the terms of the bylaw be amended to remove “telecommunications services” from the definition of “utility provider” because telecommunications is the jurisdiction of the federal government. The bylaw forced entities to get – in some cases multiple – permits to construct within rights-of-way.
The bylaw effectively gave the city the power…
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MAGOG, Que. – The Québec government said today it will help fund 66 projects selected from its “Régions branchées” call for broadband expansion announced in October 2019.
The new builds will provide broadband Internet at a comparable price to those offered in urban areas to more than 60,000 households. Please click here to see the list of projects.
The selected projects are located in 11 regions of Quebec, namely those of Bas-Saint-Laurent, Saguenay – Lac-Saint-Jean, Capitale-Nationale, Mauricie, Estrie, Outaouais, Chaudière-Appalaches, Lanaudière, Laurentides, Montérégie and Center-du-Québec. The government contribution to the projects, which will be carried out by Cogeco, Bell, Videotron,…
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VANCOUVER – This week Telus officially launched Call Control, an new service the company says is an improvement on the CRTC’s best practices for call filtering services and universal call blocking.
Call control is a free feature available to home phone customers in B.C. and Alberta – and now to all wireless customers nationally which blocks the majority of autodialed calls from reaching customers.
The majority of nuisance calls, including scams, are generated by computer-dialers that enable spammers to dial many numbers at once and are normally unable to respond to the Call Control message. Of the first group of…
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CALGARY and EDMONTON – Telus announced today it will help bring virtual summer science camps to Canadian kids this summer.
The company, along with Telus Spark, Telus World of Science – Edmonton, and Microsoft announced they have joined forces to bring science camps online with the launch of Virtual Summer Camps powered by Telus.
“As social distancing guidelines evolve at different paces throughout the country, these camps will ensure children across Canada will have access to a world-class STEM-based learning program this summer,” reads the press release.
The camps will be run by the experts at Telus Spark and Telus World of…
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