Roch Dubé has been named as the new president of Aliant Telecom. The former president/CEO of Connexim, who has also worked at Bell Canada and Bell Sygma (now CGI), will also serve as EVP of parent company Aliant Inc.

Unlock all the Canadian telecom, broadcasting and digital media news you need.

Take a free trial or subscribe to The Wire Report now.

BCE looking to sell international telco
BCE Inc. has indicated it plans to put its Bell Canada International division up for sale. In a conference for analysts, the telecom giant said it would begin listing BCI under "discontinued operations" starting in the first quarter of next year. BCI also announced a reorganizing plan that will see its Telecom Americas Ltd. joint venture focusing on the wireless market in Brazil.

Unlock all the Canadian telecom, broadcasting and digital media news you need.

Take a free trial or subscribe to The Wire Report now.

The CRTC has rejected a proposal by the City of Toronto that would see it strike a contract from the record of a forthcoming proceeding. But a dissenting commissioner worries that future debate may get bogged down in picayune details.

Unlock all the Canadian telecom, broadcasting and digital media news you need.

Take a free trial or subscribe to The Wire Report now.

Another provincial telco wants to move into the cable TV business, but this time around the CRTC apparently wants to ensure that corporate convergence doesn’t strangle competition. MTS Communications Inc. has filed an application for a broadcasting distribution undertaking (BDU) licence to serve Manitoba to become the latest telco to enter the broadcast field.

Unlock all the Canadian telecom, broadcasting and digital media news you need.

Take a free trial or subscribe to The Wire Report now.

Community broadband networks are proving to be a most effective manner of delivering bandwidth, especially to smaller and remote areas. Several presentations at a conference held last week in Ottawa highlighted the progress being made in the rollout of such networks.

Unlock all the Canadian telecom, broadcasting and digital media news you need.

Take a free trial or subscribe to The Wire Report now.

The federal government’s decision to allocate funding for an upgraded national fibre network is being heralded by the agency that oversees the project. CANARIE Inc. is now in the process of selecting suppliers.

Unlock all the Canadian telecom, broadcasting and digital media news you need.

Take a free trial or subscribe to The Wire Report now.

The federal government’s decision to postpone the rollout of high-speed Internet across the country was a disappointment for many observers. But they do hold out hope that the delay will give the industry more time to convince a skeptical public the project is worthwhile.

Unlock all the Canadian telecom, broadcasting and digital media news you need.

Take a free trial or subscribe to The Wire Report now.

CRTC introduces 2002 contribution rate
Canada’s telecom regulator, the CRTC, has set the interim rate for contribution charges for next year. The 2002 rate has been set at 1.4 per cent, a significant decrease over the 4.5 per cent rate applied in 2001. In addition, the commission has set the total subsidy required at $279 million, nearly three-quarters of the national pool that was supposedly needed for this year.
The decrease will more than likely be greeted with delight by all telecommunications service providers. This move will have the greatest impact on wireless companies, which saw their portion of the contribution pool increase by 1,200 per cent from 2000 to 2001.
In the decision, Order CRTC 2001-876, there was no specific mention of the impact on the wireless carriers. With a decision still pending on the amount of handset revenue that can be deducted from the total contribution payment, the amount mobile operators have to pay in will likely change. More details.

Unlock all the Canadian telecom, broadcasting and digital media news you need.

Take a free trial or subscribe to The Wire Report now.