By Murray Lyons
The StarPhoenix
Saturday, February 21, 2004

A Saskatoon manufacturer of broadband communications hardware has bought two small cable television companies in British Columbia.

VCom Inc. -- the former WaveCom Electronics -- has taken over Revelstoke Cable TV Ltd. and an even smaller cable company in the nearby town of Naskup.

Darcy Parker, VCom's manager of cable and wireless systems, says the acquisition gives the company a full-scale research platform for its products.

"One of our reasons why we got the cable company is that, as we develop new products for the cable industry, it gives us a live test bed," said Parker.

VCom, a privately held company, didn't release the price it paid for the two cable systems. Parker said VCom did not have to bid against any major cable companies to acquire the system and that VCom would be interested in acquiring further small town systems.

Two way high speed internet via satellite

New Residential satellite service offerings to Canada featuring DIRECWAY® satellite technology.

Effective immediately, Broadband Ontario Incorporated announces a new Residential internet satellite service offering to Ontario and Canada.

February 13, 2004
By William David Gardner

One of the features of Inukshuk's Internet service is a feature termed nomadicity.

It's still dark this time of the year in Yellowknife in the Canadian Northwest Territories, but the difficult terrain has attracted a new wireless broadband technology tailor-made for the Far North. Launched this week, the service features a service called "nomadicity," which, as the name implies, enables users to use the service as they move about the region.

Globe and Mail Update

ANDOVER, Mass., and SAULT STE. MARIE, Ont., Feb.

Time Warner unit to take on Bell, Telus by offering the Internet service to 500,000

by Mark Evans
Financial Post
January 24, 2004

Canada's $5-billion local telephony industry is poised to get even more competitive later this year when AOL Canada Inc. jumps into the market with a variety of voice services using Internet-based technology.

The CBC reports that a Hydro Ottawa affilliate is in the preliminary testing stages of powerline broadband in the Ottawa area.

Here's something worth looking into. Looks like there will be an affordable solution finally that will allow people outside of city centres to get high speed internet. There's a hint that it may be mobile too!

»sympatico.globeandmail.com/servl···chnology

»www.indiantelevision.com/headlin···146.htm


Well someone has to be third, Keep it up Canada!!

By Ben Charny
CNET News.com
November 4, 2003, 5:01 PM PT

Thanks to cheaper Internet phone dialing, Labatt Brewery was able to offer a free long-distance phone service to thousands of residents of Ontario, Canada.

There was just one catch: every time any of the 1,000 new subscribers a day dialed out, they had to listen to a 10-second Labatt commercial.

WHISTLER, Canada--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov. 3, 2003--Whistler Cable Television Ltd., the largest broadband Internet service provider in Whistler, today unveiled its Whooshnet Wireless(TM) Internet service, providing Whistler visitors portable Internet access throughout the popular resort community.

A telecom equipment maker with strong roots in Saskatoon has set up shop in Ottawa and secured $18 million in second-round financing. Critical Telecom Corp., founded 16 years ago in Saskatoon as Critical Control, has developed a next-generation DSL technology called Full Rate Extended DSL, or FRED for short. FRED is meant to allow telecom service providers to better compete with high-speed cable Internet services from firms such as Rogers and Shaw. The technology allows for high-speed data services to be delivered over normal telephone lines to customers up to 25 kilometres from their service provider's central office, much further than existing technology. (full article here)

By Gerry Blackwell

Who knew that ski resorts were so competitive? When The Resort Municipality of Whistler in British Columbia, Canada decided to roll out yodel, a community-wide Wi-Fi hotzone service, getting an edge on other ski resorts was a stated objective.

"One of the benefits was definitely the competitive advantage it would give us," says John Rae, Whistler's manager of strategic alliances and marketing services, and a prime mover on the project.

By Gerry Blackwell

Canada's four major cellular carriers last month scored a North American first when they agreed to work out details on a Wi-Fi hotspot roaming arrangement that would let users of one company's hotspots easily use others' hotspots as well.

It wasn't quite a global first -- a group of mobile carriers in France announced a similar initiative a few weeks before.

By Richard Shim
CNET

New wireless networking chips for handheld devices are giving second life to the 802.11b standard and could soon test the theory that Wi-Fi and cellular data services can work hand in hand rather than compete.

As previously reported, chipmakers Broadcom and Royal Philips Electronics have developed new Wi-Fi chips that will speed up the use of wireless networking on high-profile portable devices, including cellphones. Broadcom and Philips Semiconductor, a division of Royal Philips Electronics, on Monday announced the new chips — smaller, cheaper and more power-efficient versions of their current 802.11b products.

The chips create new and highly promising uses for the 802.11b standard, which is being eclipsed on PCs by the faster 802.11g, opening the door for devices that combine Wi-Fi and next-generation cellular capabilities.

»www.globetechnology.com/servlet/···hnology/

Pronto Networks of Pleasanton said Monday it has partnered with Canadian firm Psion Teklogix to offer comprehensive wireless local area network, or WLAN, installation and maintenance services.

Under the terms of the deal, the network services division of Psion will offer WLAN installation and maintenance services on a global basis for Pronto' customers. Pronto is a provider of carrier-class OSS solutions for large Wi-Fi hot spot networks.

Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

»eastbay.bizjournals.com/eastbay/···y6.html

By Erin Joyce

Bell Canada and Nortel Networks are teaming up to build out new IP telephony services for the telecom giant's enterprise customers, a move that comes with an initial investment of $146 million (US, $200 million CDN) over three years.

Bell Canada said it plans to work in conjunction with Aliant and Bell West along with Nortel Networks (Quote, Company Info) on the "next generation network," which would include new voice and multimedia services and applications.

(Kanata, Ottawa, Canada - Aug. 28, 2003) (featureXpress) -- Simmic.Net, Inc.

The National Post reported today that Cybersurf (»www.cybersurf.net) has signed an agreement with Rogers Communications to resell Cable modem service. They hope to be starting in Toronto next month and the price should be $30! The article also states that Cybersurf has signed a wholesale DSL agreement with Bell for Ontario and Quebec and that they are before the CRTC with Shaw over access to their cable modem network.

Full article here: »www.nationalpost.com/financialpo···EA33FFF9

The CRTC ruled today that ILECs (Incumbent Local Exchange Carriers) must split their high-speed xDSL offering off their local telephone service offering.
Story available here:
»www.cbc.ca/stories/2003/07/21/cr···t030721

Full CRTC decision available here:
»www.crtc.gc.ca/archive/ENG/Decis···3-49.htm

-may have to c/p the link

»www.globeinvestor.com/servlet/Ar···ks/news

Rising costs are being blamed for a grim future for Canadian ISPs according to a recent StatsCan report. With almost half the providers posting losses in 2001, the smaller companies also face "intense competition' from the large telco and cableco providers rolling out "lite" access packages.