NL Short Takes

Bell Canada rustles up contract with StampedeThe eastern ILEC heads out west as Bell Canada signs a five-year exclusive agreement with the Calgary Stampede to provide telecom services. The telco will offer LD, high-speed Internet, network infrastructure, wireless and satellite services. No financial terms were disclosed. 360networks wins extensions on both sides of borderTroubled fibre builder 360networks Inc. has been granted six-month extensions to restructure by courts in British Columbia and New York. The Supreme Court of B.C. has given the firm until July 2 to reorganize under the Canada’s Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act, while the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York has extended the cash collateral order until July 1. Manitoba Telecom merges two ecom subsidiariesManitoba Telecom Services Inc. has combined the operations of its two ecommerce divisions. MTS purchased The Exocom Group Inc. last year and is now bringing it under the umbrella of its other e-business subsidiary, Qunara Inc. The telco is also joining with the city of Winkler to create a Smart Community Project. Telus sets financial and operating targets for 2002Telus Corp. is projecting a 4 to 6% increase in revenues this year over 2001, although it expects EBITDA will remain flat. It bases those predictions on the effects of the CRTC’s new contribution mechanism, portions of which the western ILEC is appealing. It predicts a huge jump in its number of Internet subscribers, suggesting they should top 200,000 this year. Shaw, Ted Rogers both dispose of @Home sharesAt the Dec. 7 AGM of Shaw Communications Inc., CEO Jim Shaw noted the company had made a profit of approximately $600 million by selling off its stake in @Home Corp. over the past few years. Last month, Rogers Communications Inc. president/CEO Ted Rogers sold his remaining 2 million shares for a total of US$60,000 to $100,000. Despite recession, telecom marketplace still expandingA new survey by American market researcher Gartner Dataquest predicts growth in the international telecom market despite the current economic slump. It is expected global telecommunications revenue will be US$1.4 trillion in 2001, a hike of 8% from the year before. Bell to use Nortel VoIP gear with major corporate clientsBell Canada will be testing a new VoIP product this month with its largest business Centrex customers. The initial release of the Nortel Networks Corp. Interactive Multimedia Server will be in January with additional services and applications being available in Q2. Sympatico-Lycos signs deal with canada.comInternet portal Sympatico-Lycos Inc. signed an agreement with canada.com that will see Sympatico’s YellowPages.ca power the online directory functions. YellowPages.ca, which is owned by Bell, provides services on the Canada411.ca site. City councillor seeks to drop LD zones in merged cityLawrence Cannon, a councillor in the city of Gatineau and a one-time communications minister in Quebec, is calling on Bell to drop the LD charges applied in the newly-merged city. The telco is using the LD boundaries that were in effect when the west Quebec cities of Aylmer, Hull and Gatineau were separate entities. A similar fight is taking place across the river in Ottawa, which consolidated last year (NL, Apr. 9/01). New VC fund to operate in Ontario high-tech citiesStartingStartups Capital Corp. is a new labour-sponsored VC fund concentrating on the IT sector in Ottawa and Waterloo ON. The fund is also eligible under the province’s Research Oriented Investment Fund program, allowing investors a 35% tax credit rather than the 30% from non-ROIF funds. Lack of funding led to the shuttering of Esion Networks. The Ottawa broadband firm was set up in July 2000 and came to a halt when an early investor decided to pull out, just before some larger VCs were about to put money into the company. British Telecom denies fixed-line grid for saleBritish Telecommunications has denied a report in the Observer newspaper that it plans to unload its fixed-line network. A German bank offered BT US$36 billion for its network. Chair Sir Christopher Bland says the company is considering moving into offering broadcasting services in the face of competition from cablecos. American cableco to offer VoIP telephony in EuropeLiberty Media of Englewood CO is about to provide VoIP telephony in Germany as a condition of being able to purchase cable operations in the country. President/CEO Robert Bennett would not say how widely available the service will be. Mexican telcos seek to derail new telecom levySeveral telephone companies in Mexico are seeking an injunction to stop the implementation of a new telecommunications tax. The 10% levy, passed by the Mexican Congress at the beginning of the month, is imposed on a variety of services, including high-speed Internet and high capacity data services. Regional network funding announced in British ColumbiaCANARIE Inc. is providing the Optical Regional Advanced Network (ORAN) project in British Columbia with $1.5 million in funding. BCNet, the provincial advanced network group, will use the money to upgrade equipment and to supplement funds to create high-speed networks in Vancouver, Victoria and Prince George. Deutsche Telekom accused of inflating billing statementsA competitor is accusing German incumbent telco Deutsche Telekom of making huge mistakes on its interconnection bills. Communitel founder Bernd Stoetzel told the magazine Der Spiegel that the telco’s bills are "on average 46% too high" and is threatening to demand compensation of 27 million DM (about C$20 million). Deutsche Telekom says its mistakes are "regrettable" but dismisses Stoetzel’s complaints as "completely absurd."

NL Short Takes

News | January 14, 2002

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