TORONTO – HBO Canada wants viewers to binge watch its new Canadian dramedy Sensitive Skin, and is making the entire first season available to subscribers online and on demand following its broadcast debut next Sunday.
The bittersweet comedy stars and is executive produced by Golden Globe Award winner and Emmy Award nominee Kim Cattrall along with Genie and Tony Award winner Don McKellar, who also directs all six episodes. Based on the original British version, Sensitive Skin is about a woman of a certain age and her long-time husband attempting to change their lives.
Sensitive Skin will premiere July 20 at…
Continue Reading
GATINEAU – The press release headlines sound pretty good, but it’s in the conditions, the details, where all this talk of consumer choice and flexibility gets bogged down.
The three largest Canadian vertically integrated media and carriage companies (Bell, Shaw and Rogers) each issued press releases Friday – the day their submissions to the CRTC on its TV Policy Review were due – saying, and we’re paraphrasing here: “boy oh boy, are we consumer friendly and choice leaders!” The big three each said they support more pick and pay, or a-la-carte channel selection, so that Canadians…
Continue Reading
MONTREAL – Stingray Digital has finalized an agreement with Mood Media Corporation for its remaining 8,000 Canadian commercial accounts, and will continue to be Mood’s exclusive partner for the representation of their products and services in Canada.
Through the agreement, announced Friday, Stingray will continue to provide its 72,000 commercial clients with music services, digital signage solutions and other value added services. Clients now serviced by Stingray’s commercial account team include Loblaws, Telus and Mark’s Work Warehouse retail locations.
“We strongly believe in the continued growth of our commercial music services in Canada and as stated in a recent SOCAN…
Continue Reading
TORONTO – Struggling Mobilicity has received another extension to its creditor protection.
After filing materials earlier this week with the Ontario Superior Court of Justice, the wireless carrier confirmed Wednesday that it has received a further extension under its current CCAA proceedings from June 30 to September 26, 2014. It was initially granted creditor protection last September.
Mobilicity added that it’s previously announced mediation is ongoing and it "continues to be business as usual” for customers.
All things considered, the company is hanging on, with 157,000 customers as of June 16th, according to the Monitor's Report, and "that management expects this number…
Continue Reading
TORONTO – Wind Mobile Canada has never been so candid, or detailed, about its numbers.
During his luncheon keynote Tuesday, Wind CEO Tony Lacavera released subscriber, ARPU and various other metrics that make Wind, now with about 740,000 Canadian customers, look like a growing, viable, business – despite the hundreds of millions in debt owed from 2008 spectrum purchases and its network build since then.
But there’s a method to that data dump. Wind needs investors. With its foreign backer Vimpelcom having written Wind Canada’s value down to zero, that gave license to pundits, analysts and competitors…
Continue Reading
TORONTO – Wholesale wireless service continues to be a prickly topic between wireless incumbents and new entrants, and quickly became a dominant theme Tuesday morning during the Canadian Telecom Summit’s annual regulatory blockbuster panel, moderated again this year by Cartt.ca editor and publisher Greg O’Brien.
Bell, Rogers and Telus remained steadfast in their collective belief that increased regulation on wholesale wireless services will result in decreased network investments. Ken Engelhart, SVP regulatory for Rogers Communications, got that ball rolling early in the 90 minute panel, raising the matter in his opening “trite observations”.
“Wholesale regulation inevitably leads to a reduction in investment,…
Continue Reading
TORONTO – Wind Mobile chairman and CEO Tony Lacavera was on the attack again today during a luncheon keynote at CTS in Toronto, going after what he says are continuing anti-competitive behaviours of the big three wireless companies and suggesting further policy changes to the federal government.
However, Lacavera lifted the veil off of a range of Wind Canada financial metrics, too, today. So many in fact, it made us believe he is casting as wide a net as possible for more investors, or even preparing the company for a public offering.
Wind, as Lacavera’s speech also pointed out, is trapped….
Continue Reading
LOS ANGELES – Keri Levinsky has been promoted to the role of vice president, Canada Television Distribution for MGM Television, where she will oversee MGM Television’s Canada office.
Levinsky (pictured) will continue reporting to John Bryan, president of domestic television distribution for MGM. She previously served as director, Canada Television Distribution for MGM Television where she was responsible for feature film and television distribution to pay TV, free TV, cable TV, PPV/VOD, EST, SVOD and FVOD providers, for English and French Canada. Prior to joining MGM Television in 2011, Levinsky was senior manager, business development and content for Telus.
Additionally, Greg…
Continue Reading
WATERLOO, ON – BlackBerry has signed a new three-year agreement with EnStream, a mobile payments joint venture between Bell, Rogers and Telus, to provide a secure platform that supports transaction services between banks and consumers.
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Under the agreement, EnStream will use infrastructure to enable financial institutions, like Royal Bank, TD Bank, CIBC and Desjardins, and mobile operators to securely provision sensitive payment card credentials into any smartphone capable of near field communication.
BlackBerry said that given its requirements for security, the mobile payments space continues to be an area of focus. The company…
Continue Reading
DENVER and TORONTO – World Fishing Network posted the highest single-month viewership in the history of the network during the month of April as part of its North American free preview.
Overall, WFN said that it experienced a 265% increase in average audience viewership in the U.S. during the preview period. Participating providers included Antietam Cable, Bright House Networks, Cablevision (Optimum), CenturyLink, Cox Communications, DISH, MetroNet and Verizon FiOS.
In Canada, Access, Bell, Cablevision du Nord du Quebec, Cogeco, Eastlink, MTS, Rogers, SaskTel, Shaw Cable, Shaw Direct, Source Cable, TBayTel, Telus, Videotron and Westman participated in the preview. While Canadian television…
Continue Reading