TORONTO – While press releases swirled all around today from CHUM Ltd. and its co-appellants and from Canadian Satellite Radio responding and re-responding to what CHUM had to say, Canada’s other satellite radio license holder, SIRIUS Canada, is quietly getting ready for its fall launch.
That’s not to say that the newly minted company isn’t on side with CSR saying the appeals are all bunk.
“Clearly there’s nothing raised by any of the now-three appeals that is in any way different than the issues that were well-covered at the CRTC hearing,” SIRIUS Canada president and CEO Kevin Shea told www.cartt.ca on Tuesday. SIRIUS Canada is a partnership with the U.S. company, the CBC and Standard Broadcasting.
“It’s a bit disconcerting to us because there’s nothing new (in the complaints). We’ll deal with it on August 2nd when we will file our response to the appeals.”
But how far along is SIRIUS Canada right now? CSR has been issuing press release after release while SIRIUS has remained quiet.
“Their situation is far different from ours,” says Shea. “As is now on the public record, (John) Bitove (CSR’s owner) plans to do an IPO – he has to raise capital to build and we don’t.”
“We’re busy working on our strategy and tend not to be as public, but you’ll hear from us,” added Shea.
Will it launch in the fall? “Absolutely,” he said. “We will be announcing things in the weeks ahead.”
The two satellite companies are far different than they might appear to an outsider, Shea added. “(Canadian Satellite Radio) has to build 120 to 150 retransmitters because the XM signal is not really that strong in Canada. We don’t have any of those issues whatsoever.
“We don’t even need them but we are building eight retransmitters in the urban markets. I’ve had it in my car for the last year and there’s been no loss of signal whatsoever whereas it’s a bit different with XM.”
“Satellite radio was invented by a Canadian, David Margolis (the founder of SIRIUS), which was the first out of the blocks in 1990. SIRIUS was built and designed to be a North American service at that point in time,” Shea added.
“XM is a Johnny-come-lately using some Hughes satellites that were not really ever intended or designed for all of North America.”
So, to get it to work in Canada, especially in urban markets, CSR “has got a significant requirement for capital to get going,” Shea concluded.
– Greg O’Brien
