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CRTC modifies Telus tariffs on digital network access
telecom | 02/10/2023 3:51 pm EST
In a Friday decision, the CRTC approved with modifications three tariff notifications submitted by Telus Corp. The trio of applications were filed in January 2022.
Two of the applications sought to change digital network access and inter-exchange digital channels. The...
Distributel wouldn’t be able to offer Shaw pricing if it bought Freedom, Tribunal hears
telecom | 11/11/2022 11:37 am EST
Distributel Communications Ltd. attempted to become the divestiture partner for Shaw Communication Inc.’s Freedom Mobile, but it was never in a position to replicate its...
Britain and Australia provide example for internet ads, PIAC says
telecom | 08/17/2022 6:52 pm EDT
Canada should look to Britain and Australia for lessons on how to regulate...
Mobile prices down but high internationally, broadband prices up and still high internationally: ISED report
telecom | 07/06/2022 5:30 pm EDT
In 2021, consumer mobile wireless fell by as much...
CRTC outlines framework to block botnets from internet traffic
telecom | 06/23/2022 5:48 pm EDT
In a Thursday decision, the CRTC announced it was implementing regulations...
Building owner ordered to give Rogers access to Toronto facility
telecom | 06/08/2022 2:53 pm EDT
The CRTC gave Rogers Communications Inc. permission Wednesday to access a...
Supreme Court dismisses TekSavvy appeal of GoldTV site-blocking order
Media | 03/24/2022 1:28 pm EDT
Updated with TekSavvy reaction.
The Supreme Court of Canada Thursday morning dismissed a last effort by TekSavvy Solutions Inc. to challenge Canada's first-ever...
Primus expanding in Quebec
telecom | 10/07/2021 5:32 pm EDT
Distributel Communications Ltd.'s Primus Communications is expanding its offering in Quebec, and is now covering an additional 71 per cent of the region, according to a...
Disaggregated wholesale regime not ‘doom and gloom’: CNOC chair
telecom | 09/29/2021 5:33 pm EDT
With a shift to a disaggregated access model anticipated by the Competitive...
New ‘dynamic’ site-blocking needs new safeguards: CIPPIC
Media | 09/22/2021 5:56 pm EDT
The site-blocking order that will block a rolling list of pirate streaming...
Distributel waives long-distance calling charges to Haiti, Afghanistan
telecom | 08/20/2021 4:49 pm EDT
On the heels of Quebecor Inc.'s Videotron announcement Wednesday, Distributel Communications Ltd. said Friday that -- along with its recently acquired Primus subsidiary -- it would be suspending...
Bell, Rogers, and Quebecor seek first-ever ‘dynamic’ site-blocking order
Media | 07/08/2021 6:22 pm EDT
Nearly six weeks after a Federal Court of Appeal upheld Canada's first-ever...
ISED rejects request to delay 3500 MHz auction following MVNO decision
telecom | 04/29/2021 6:31 pm EDT
Innovation Minister François-Philippe Champagne has rejected a call by the...
UPDATED – CRTC rejects broad MVNO model, will mandate limited access for regional players
telecom | 04/15/2021 4:01 pm EDT
Incumbent telecom companies will be required to...
CRTC rejects incumbent request to expand Internet Code
telecom | 04/08/2021 5:05 pm EDT
The CRTC has rejected a request from a number of large facilities-based...
Without an MVNO mandate, Shaw must divest its spectrum: CNOC
telecom | 04/06/2021 6:07 pm EDT
Without a regime for mandated access for mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs), the regulatory authorities in charge of reviewing the proposed merger between Rogers Communications Inc. and Shaw Communications Inc. should force the companies to spin off the Freedom Mobile...
New urgency for MVNO hopefuls following Rogers-Shaw deal
telecom | 03/18/2021 12:09 pm EDT
Monday’s announcement of a deal for Rogers Communications Inc. to acquire...
Distributel’s Primus acquisition ‘just fits,’ CEO says
telecom | 01/19/2021 5:52 pm EST
Distributel Communications Ltd. has acquired telecom service provider Primus from Fusion Connect Inc. in what Distributel CEO Matt Stein said Tuesday was a “major acquisition” for the company. ...
Bell tells court cabinet decision on wholesale ‘vindicates’ its concerns
telecom | 08/20/2020 5:52 pm EDT
BCE Inc. and a coalition of cable companies have submitted letters to the...
Bell bringing cabinet’s wholesale appeal response to Federal Court
telecom | 08/17/2020 7:56 pm EDT
Lawyers representing BCE Inc. have asked a Federal Court of Appeal judge to...
CIRA, CIPPIC, BCCLA intervene in site-blocking case
telecom | 08/04/2020 5:07 pm EDT
In a much-watched appeal of Canada's first-ever site-blocking court order, three separate opponents of the order have filed two interventions asking the Federal Court of Appeal to strike down the order. In the first of the two interventions, the Samuelson-Glushko Canadian Internet Policy & Public Interest Clinic at the University of Ottawa (CIPPIC) and the Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA) jointly argue that the orders disrupt a balance between rights-holders and the free dissemination of information grounded in the Copyright Act, and that the order supersedes...
Telecoms end overage fees suspension
telecom | 07/02/2020 4:52 pm EDT
Major Canadian telecoms have ended one of their major relief measures for Canadians who suddenly shifted...
Wholesale rates stay ‘forces’ Distributel to apply temporary surcharge
telecom | 06/03/2020 3:18 pm EDT
Distributel Communications Ltd. will charge a “very small” number of customers a $5 temporary surcharge on each internet bill, due to a legal challenge against last year’s wholesale rates...
SaskTel to resume charging overage fees on June 9
telecom | 05/29/2020 2:13 pm EDT
Saskatchewan Telecommunications Holding Corp. will become the second Canadian telecom to resume charging overage fees to home internet customers who go over their data caps, with the company announcing it will end the COVID-19...
Wholesale rate appeal to go ahead in June via video conference
telecom | 05/25/2020 6:05 pm EDT
A Federal Court of Appeal judge has rejected the argument made by the incumbent telecom companies last week that their appeal of the CRTC's wholesale broadband rates decision is too complicated to be...
Cogeco to bring back overage fees as of May 1
telecom | 04/30/2020 2:10 pm EDT
Cogeco Inc. will again start charging overage fees to its home internet customers who exceed their data limits as of Friday, with the company instead focusing on other measures it considers to “be more essential” to its...
Networks coping, but future traffic impossible to predict
Media | 03/25/2020 5:48 pm EDT
Experts say Canada’s telecommunications networks are currently handling a...
Investment cut threats over MVNOs not ‘just theater’: Telus
telecom | 02/20/2020 6:30 pm EST
GATINEAU, Que. — Toward the tail end of nearly three hours of testimony...
CIPPIC, CIRA to challenge court authority in site-blocking case
telecom | 02/07/2020 3:54 pm EST
Both the Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA) and the Canadian...
Bell says CRTC used bad costing process in wholesale rate decision
telecom | 01/03/2020 5:28 pm EST
In yet another appeal of the CRTC’s decision lowering wholesale internet rates, BCE Inc. filed a fresh review-and-vary application to the regulator the week before Christmas, arguing that that the CRTC relied on an “irrevocably broken” underlying costing process and framework. The CRTC’s methodology, Bell argues in the Dec. 20 filing, delivered rates that were below cost for Bell, and “failed to follow proper costing principles or prior Commission directives in developing the...
CNOC’s Stein pitches municipal-ISP cooperation to roll out rural broadband
telecom | 11/15/2019 3:34 pm EST
NORTH BAY, Ont. — President of the Canadian Network Operators Consortium...
Large telecoms say small ISPs should be subject to Internet Code too
telecom | 11/08/2019 5:20 pm EST
A few months ahead of the introduction of the CRTC’s Internet Code, scheduled for Jan. 31,, a grouping of the largest telecom companies in the country are asking the regulator to make the code apply...
Wholesale-based ISPs at a ‘critical’ crossroads: CNOC’s Stein
telecom | 11/05/2019 3:22 pm EST
TORONTO — Smaller, wholesale-based internet service providers may be...
Telecoms say CRTC wholesale decision violates Harper-era directive
telecom | 09/17/2019 5:13 pm EDT
In their Friday appeal of the CRTC decision on wholesale internet rates, the affected cable companies are asking the Federal Court of Appeal to defer to a 2006 Harper-era directive that advised the...
New aggregated wholesale rates ‘fair,’ ‘reasonable’: smaller ISPs
telecom | 08/15/2019 6:16 pm EDT
Wholesale-based ISPs are praising a decision by the CRTC to lower the rates they pay for wholesale access under the aggregated regime, though whether the regulator will issue...
Some consumers uncertain about wholesale competitor quality: Comp Bureau
telecom | 08/07/2019 11:00 am EDT
Despite being “impressed” by the competitive presence of...
Telus appealing CRTC speed cap relief
telecom | 04/18/2019 5:00 pm EDT
Telus Corp. is going to court over the CRTC’s decision last month to grant smaller internet providers a...
Small telecoms call for more forceful language in policy direction
telecom | 04/16/2019 6:19 pm EDT
The CRTC’s new, consumer-focused policy direction doesn’t go far...
CRTC lifts 100 Mbps wholesale internet speed cap – for now
telecom | 03/21/2019 5:39 pm EDT
The CRTC has quietly informed wholesale-based internet service providers...
‘Competition’ definition key to impact of new CRTC directive: experts
telecom | 02/27/2019 6:08 pm EST
The new policy direction for the CRTC announced by the federal government...
Lack of clear CRTC industry data is an obstacle: small ISPs
telecom | 02/13/2019 8:47 pm EST
TekSavvy Solutions Inc. has filed a complaint with the CRTC flagging a concern that the regulator’s latest data report doesn’t provide a clear picture of the industry, which could make it more...
ISPs can resell wholesale service to other providers: CRTC
telecom | 12/11/2018 5:59 pm EST
The CRTC has sided with a small telecom that was reselling wholesale...
Distributel goes with MobiTV for IPTV
telecom | 11/06/2018 10:42 am EST
Distributel Communications Ltd. is partnering with MobiTV Inc. to deliver its IPTV service, it said...
Matt Stein named CNOC president
telecom | 06/19/2018 1:38 pm EDT
The Canadian Network Operators’ Consortium (CNOC) has named its spokesman and vice-chair Matt Stein the new president and chairman of the organization, CNOC said in a press release Monday.
Stein, who is also the CEO of Distributel Communications Ltd., replaces Michael Garbe, who was named president in 2016.
Garbe will stay on with the organization as a board member, the release said.
Peter Rocca, CEO of Start Communications, is the new vice-chairman of the board, while Execulink Telecom president and CEO Ian Stevens will become treasurer.
CORRECTION: A previous version of this story stated Michael Garbe was named president last year....
Bains says spectrum auction dates to give industry predictability
telecom | 06/06/2018 6:51 pm EDT
TORONTO — Innovation Minister Navdeep Bains announced Wednesday the...
Frontier-Eastlink tariff tiff could affect other ISPs, CNOC warns
telecom | 04/30/2018 5:13 pm EDT
A dispute between two internet service providers (ISPs) over the...
TNW pushing ahead with Part 1 despite WiFi MVNO decision
telecom | 03/28/2018 1:19 pm EDT
TNW Wireless Inc. is still hopeful the CRTC will rule in its favour in a...
Distributel teams up with Eeyou network on northern Quebec service
telecom | 01/17/2018 4:01 pm EST
A Cree-owned non-profit will partner with Distributel Communications Ltd....
Disaggregated regime to spark new wholesale models, agreements: CNOC
telecom | 11/07/2017 6:12 pm EST
TORONTO — The CRTC’s new disaggregated wholesale regime will bring with it enormous costs to connect customers to fibre and will give birth to new wholesale models,...
Distributel’s TNW buy part of wider expansion plans: CEO
telecom | 10/11/2017 6:19 pm EDT
Distributel Communications Ltd. is acquiring “selected assets” of a...
Small providers, incumbents clash over WiFi-based MVNOs
telecom | 09/12/2017 5:54 pm EDT
Mandating wholesale roaming access to Wi-Fi-based mobile virtual network operators (MVNO) will encourage innovation and competition by providing...
High interim tariffs, logistics still mire disaggregated system
telecom | 08/31/2017 5:13 pm EDT
The CRTC's goal of fuelling wireline competition by jumpstarting the...
Small ISPs welcome rollout of disaggregated wholesale regime
telecom | 08/29/2017 6:17 pm EDT
The CRTC kickstarted the industry’s move to a disaggregated wholesale...
FCC’s net neutrality changes could affect Canada, some experts say
telecom | 07/12/2017 4:37 pm EDT
On Wednesday, major internet and tech companies teamed up to rally against...
CRTC effectively bans most zero-rating in differential pricing decision
Media | 04/20/2017 8:04 pm EDT
As the CRTC banned most forms of differential pricing practices Thursday — including declaring that telecoms can’t pick and chose Internet content to zero-rate and...
Proposal would give Bell ‘significant and asymmetric powers’: small ISPs
telecom | 03/06/2017 8:59 pm EST
The CRTC should deny a proposal by BCE Inc. for a new regime governing traffic pumping that would allow telecoms to unilaterally put in place penalties that “inflict substantial...
Indie ISPs have less restrictive data caps: OpenMedia report
telecom | 10/13/2016 7:05 pm EDT
A new report from OpenMedia says that when it comes to residential wireline Internet service, small Internet Service Providers (ISPs) “have less restrictive data caps and more regions with...
CRTC doesn’t need disconnection heads up, interveners say
telecom | 09/26/2016 7:09 pm EDT
New regulations that would require telecom companies to tell the CRTC if they’re going to disconnect another company from their network are unnecessary, according to the majority of interveners who submitted feedback to the CRTC’s call for comments on disconnection practices. Most contracts between carriers or between carriers and resellers already have a notification period built in, eliminating the need for further oversight by the CRTC, said many of those who filed comments before the Sept. 19 deadline. The commission launched the consultation as a result of a January dispute that left 27,000 telephone customers without service. The CRTC asked for comment on whether there should be a minimum time frame for giving notice of intent to disconnect, if the CRTC needs...
FTTH access plan ‘consistent’ but ‘disappointing’: indie ISPs
telecom | 09/20/2016 9:52 pm EDT
The CRTC has missed an opportunity to foster innovation among telecom competitors as it moves forward in the implementation of mandated wholesale access by smaller Internet service providers (ISPs) to...
Globalive sells three small telecom companies
telecom | 09/07/2016 7:53 pm EDT
Investment company Globalive Capital has sold small telecom Yak Communications to Distributel Communications Ltd., Globalive said in a press release Wednesday. In separate deals, it also sold business telecom services...
G.fast tech to give Canadian telcos’ Internet speeds a boost
telecom | 08/25/2016 5:52 pm EDT
A new technology that allows telecoms to get speeds of hundreds of gigabits through existing copper loops is making headway in Canada, where companies are testing it out and deployment is likely to...
Michael Garbe new head of CNOC
telecom | 07/13/2016 4:35 pm EDT
Michael Garbe is taking over as chairman and CEO of the Canadian Network Operators Consortium (CNOC), while former president and chairman Bill Sandiford and former treasurer Kevin Blumberg will stay with the organization in...
Small ISPs laud government denial of Bell’s FTTH appeal
telecom | 05/11/2016 1:23 pm EDT
Independent Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and advocacy groups said Wednesday they’re encouraged by the federal government’s rejection of BCE Inc.’s appeal of the CRTC decision mandating wholesale access to fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) networks, which could be the first glimpse into the new Liberal government’s telecom policy. The denial of the appeal to cabinet petition is a “very positive signal for consumers to let them know that this new government is serious about both maintaining telecom competition, but also about respecting the CRTC’s role and...
Copyright infringement notices being used for advertising, ISPs say
Media | 04/27/2016 8:57 pm EDT
In recent weeks, BCE Inc. and HBO have begun using copyright infringement notices to steer recipients toward legal sources of TV content — but some of the Internet service providers...
Gerry Vanderpost joins Distributel as CFO
telecom | 08/20/2015 3:08 pm EDT
Distributel Communications Ltd. on Thursday announced that it has hired Gerry Vanderpost as its chief financial officer. Vanderpost had been vice-president of financial at Primus Telecommunications Canada Inc., and joined...
Distributel expands Internet services in Quebec
telecom | 07/15/2015 3:33 pm EDT
Distributel Communications Ltd. is expanding its high-speed cable Internet services to 29 more markets throughout Quebec. Some of new communities covered include Asbestos, Baie Comeau, Chelsea, Drummondville, Trois...
ISPs prepping for increase in copyright infringement notices
Media | 01/12/2015 10:11 pm EST
After "significant" investments in time and money to prepare for the notice-and-notice regime that went into effect this month, independent Internet service providers Teksavvy Solutions Inc....
ISPs aspiring to launch TV services face uncertainty
Media | 12/12/2014 6:36 pm EST
Small Internet service providers looking to provide TV service should hold off on investment because of the uncertain future of the broadcast television market, according to 3Macs analyst Troy Crandall. At the recent CRTC...