TORONTO – Expect network investment to plummet, the growth of the digital economy in Canada to stall and an invasion of well-heeled foreign broadband resellers if the recent CRTC decision on third party internet access wholesale rates is not overturned, says a report published this week by TD Securities.
While saying he expects the decision to be challenged and overturned or at least revised, TD telecom and media analyst Vince Valentini pulls no punches in his analysis, saying the Commission-set wholesale rates and retroactive rebates are bad for the incumbent carriers, their customers and Canada as…
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GATINEAU – On Friday, the CRTC launched the review it said was coming over the 36-month device financing plans certain service wireless providers recently launched, which it told those carriers to stop doing in early August.
The Commission wants to ensure the provisions of its Wireless Code, which effectively make any sort of carrier service contract longer than two years illegal (there can be no break fee beyond 24 months for a customer to pay when they leave a carrier), are upheld. The carriers which launched the new 36-month plans, first from Rogers this summer, say…
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TORONTO – Broadcaster Asian Television Network says it is continuing to feel the sting of piracy as its revenue continues to decline, but that it is hopeful the Broadcast and Telecom Legislative Review Panel might have a lifeline for it come January.
For the second quarter, ended June 30, operating revenue came in at $2.9 million, down from $3.9 million in the second quarter of 2018. Net loss for the period came in at $941,000, more than double Q2 2018’s $426,000.
“Declining revenues are predominantly as a result of increased internet piracy and consumers shifting towards illegal digital IPTV set-top…
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TORONTO – Ethnic Channels Group announced this week it has launched Schlager TV with Telus Optik TV.
The channel focuses entirely on German-language pop and folk music, current artist news, greatest hits programs, as well as special events and concert performances. Schlager, which means ‘hits’, has been one of the most popular forms of German language music for decades and 90% of Schlager TV’s programming is popular folk music from Austria and Germany, says the press release.
“The North American market offers great opportunities for a German-language music channel like Schlager TV. More than three million Canadians and fifty million…
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Eastlink says it'll slow network spending because of CRTC. Videotron, Shaw to review network investments; estimated costs now over $300M
WHILE LARGE INCUMBENT network operators mull their legal options in the wake of last week’s CRTC decision to decrease the wholesale rates third party ISPs must pay them, three more have said the decision not only costs them millions, but will cause them to rein in network expansion, which will affect rural broadband builds.
The Commission’s decision to retroactively impose the rates with the decision that took more than three years to complete also threw…
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New mega-streamer to launch here on same day and date as U.S.
BURBANK, Calif. – The Walt Disney Company announced Monday its direct-to-consumer streaming platform Disney+ will launch in Canada and The Netherlands on November 12th, the same day as its much-anticipated U.S. launch.
It will then debut in Australia and New Zealand one week after that.
However, with the Canadian rights to certain Disney content still owned by Canadian companies, we wondered what the Disney+ offer will actually look like here, because it will be a different. Netflix subscribers and CBS All Access subscribers, for example, know the content libraries found…
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Bell to cut rural broadband rollout by 20% in response; Other carriers equally disappointed, angry
MONTREAL – Bell Canada spent the weekend crunching numbers (update: Rogers did the same) and announced today that last week’s CRTC decision to slash the rates paid by independent third party internet access (TPIA) providers – retroactively, too – will have a cost which will be paid by rural Canadians.
Bell said Monday morning it has estimated the impact of the CRTC’s decision to lower wholesale fees, retroactively, to be $100 million, and in order to pay for that, it will reduce…
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GATINEAU – In a long-awaited decision, the CRTC today set final rates for wholesale access to the high speed wired networks of Bell, Cogeco, Eastlink, Rogers, SaskTel, Shaw, Telus, and Vidéotron.
The process had started in May 2015 and interim decision was rendered in October 2016. That said, this is a fight that has been going on for more than a decade.
The rates released today (which are paid by independent third party ISPs like TekSavvy and Distributel) are lower than the interim rates and retroactive to 2016. The monthly capacity rates are 15% to 43% lower…
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Telus has the overall edge among the Big Three
MOBILE ANALYTICS COMPANY Opensignal this morning released its latest study of the Canadian wireless market, work which reveals some hard numbers to support the claims often made by Canadian carriers about how their networks are fast and world-class.
Let’s start with download speeds. “Opensignal recorded big surges in download speeds for all of Canada's major operators,” reads its report. “Telus and Bell both boosted their Download Speed Experience scores beyond 50 Mbps, and all three operators now provide our users with 4G Download Speeds faster than 50 Mbps. And these rapid increases…
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THE NEXT BIG LEAP in wireless telecommunications is coming.
The current standard for mobile networks is what the tech industry calls fourth generation, or 4G. But this will soon be overtaken by fifth generation, or 5G, wireless technology. 5G offers increased data transfer speeds and will connect many more devices with almost no delayed response when receiving and sending information.
One might think the issues surrounding the development of 5G would focus on questions like whether the government should build a nationalized 5G network, or the possible health impacts of additional radio-frequency radiation. However, one issue has come to dominate the 5G…
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