Rogers offering fibre to the home in Toronto, Atlantic Canada

Rogers Communications Inc., Canada’s largest cable provider, turned on fibre-to-the-home networks in parts of Toronto and the Atlantic provinces, the company said. “Rogers is implementing a first market roll out of fibre to the home in select regions in Toronto and the Atlantic,” Rogers spokeswoman Carly Suppa-Clark said in an emailed statement Wednesday. She said the product became available earlier this month. “The new Rogers Ultimate Fibre Internet tier has download and upload speeds of up to 250 Mbps,” she said. Rogers is advertising the Ultimate Fibre service on its website, which says it includes a 500 GB monthly usage cap. The web page offers a “check availability” button where users can see if the service is available in their community. Rogers’ move to fibre-to-the-home will better position the cableco to compete with rival telco BCE Inc., which is building out fibre-to-the-home and fibre-to-the-node networks in major markets in Ontario, Quebec and Atlantic Canada. Telus Corp., MTS Allstream and SaskTel are similarly rolling out fibre networks in their operating territories in Western Canada. It was unclear Wednesday afternoon how much Rogers will invest in building out fibre. BCE's Bell Canada said this year its fibre-to-the-home build in Quebec will cost the company $240 million. The company's Bell Aliant subsidiary estimated it will spend $500 million on its fibre-to-the-home network by the end of 2012. Fibre-to-the-home networks offer both faster Internet speeds and lower maintenance costs than those that operate on copper. Incumbent cablecos Rogers Communications Inc. and Shaw Communications Inc. have come under pressure this year to offset subscriber losses in their cable TV divisions as incumbent telcos Bell and Telus aggressively compete and grow TV customers with their fibre-based Internet protocol TV (IPTV) offerings in the cablecos’ territories. The Wire Report reported last month that Rogers and Shaw, Canada's second-largest cable company, are trying to offset TV subscriber losses in part by focusing on growing their Internet customers. Rogers said in April that it plans to use new technologies to support IPTV services, a broadcast distribution service that places more capacity and speed demands on networks and is generally delivered on fibre. The company also said this month that new network upgrades allow its cable Internet customers to receive maximum theoretical speeds of up to 150 Mbps. Bell’s website lists Internet plans in Ontario that offer speeds of up to 175 Mbps on its fibre-to-the-home network, and up to 25 Mbps over its fibre-to-the-node network, which uses DSL phone lines to connect “the last mile” to customers’ homes. Shaw said last year that it launched the country's first 100 Gbps, inter-city fibre-optic network. The company also told The Wire Report in early 2011 that it intended to deploy only fibre starting in 2012 to better compete. nkyonka@thewirereport.ca

Rogers offering fibre to the home in Toronto, Atlantic Canada

News | 11/21/2012 10:35 pm EST

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