The Vancouver Sun reports that Vancouver's Aquilini family (Aquilini Investments) is interested in buying Shaw Communications' cellular network operating division Freedom Mobile, which is up for sale as Rogers Communications attempts to offload the unit to gain regulatory clearance for its proposed merger with Shaw by the end of this quarter. It wa...

Over the last couple of years, the growth of IP-based video communtications and IP videoconferencing has explodied due to the the substantial increase of work from remote locations. Video communications are expected to be smooth. Network teams need to be prepared, as video brings several unique challenges. This article will explore key video requirements and monitoring strategies to ensure the technology meets user expectations. Managing in Real Time The primary challenge differentiating managem...

More mobile devices are now connecting to more data from more sources. IT challenges are complicated by increasingly high customer expectations for always-on access and immediate application response. This complexity creates network "blind spots" where latent errors germinate, and pre-attack activity lurks. Stressed-out monitoring systems make it hard, if not impossible, to keep up with traffic and filter data "noise" at a rate that they were not designed to handle. Network blind spots have beco...

Canada's Rogers Communications reported 'solid operational improvements' in its Wireless (mobile), Cable (fixed internet/pay-TV/voice) and Media divisions in Q1 2022. Total revenue improved 4% year-on-year to CAD3.619 billion (USD2.871 billion) in the three months ended 31 March 2022. Group quarterly EBITDA rose 11% y-o-y to CAD1.539 billion, with ...

Canada's Rogers Communications has announced the successful testing of 8Gbps symmetrical fibre broadband access speeds in lab and customer trials, under a plan to launch the new download and upload speeds commercially 'in summer 2022 for customers in select areas across Ontario, New Brunswick and Newfoundland'. Rogers claims that the launch will mo...

Canada's Shaw Communications posted a 2.0% year-on-year decrease in consolidated revenue to CAD1.36 billion (USD1.08 billion) in its fiscal second quarter ended 28 February 2022. Quarterly adjusted EBITDA fell 0.8% y-o-y to CAD632 million while net income in the period dropped 9.7% y-o-y to CAD196 million. Shaw noted that the quarter experienced th...

Cubro Network Visibility commissioned Tolly, a leading global provider of third-party validation services for vendors of IT products, components and services, to evaluate the usability, storage efficiency and approach to data structure used in Custos. Tests were run by evaluating a live network simultaneously using Cubro Custos and legacy NetFlow/ ...

Bell has claimed 'the fastest internet speeds of any major provider in Canada' with the launch of a fibre broadband service offering download and upload speeds of 3Gbps, noting that its new premium fibre option provides 'total speeds three times faster than cable'. A press release noted: 'Many customers have multiple devices connected throughout th...

Xplornet Communications, Canada's largest rural-focused broadband provider, has completed the acquisition of the high speed internet business of Full Throttle Networks in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Full Throttle operates a fixed wireless network providing broadband access service to over 1,600 residential and commercial customers in Winnipeg and surroundi...

Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED) yesterday announced the launch of the second phase of the Connecting Families initiative in partnership with 14 ISPs which are offering CAD20 (USD16) per month high speed internet services aimed at low-income families and seniors. Connecting Families 2.0 introduces significantly faster ('fi...

Rogers Communications has announced the launch of Canada's first commercial 5G Standalone (SA) network services, enabling mobile customers with 5G SA capable devices including Google Pixel 6/6 Pro smartphones to connect to the new network, which was built exclusively with Ericsson. Users with suitable devices will automatically connect to the 5G SA...

ZTE Canada announced that its Connect-Hub 5G home internet gateway CPE device is now available to customers on the Telus network. The Connect-Hub 5G is offered in two variations – an Indoor Unit and Outdoor Unit – with the latter designed to boost weak signals to improve data throughput to the indoor Wi-Fi router. The Indoor and Outdoor Units suppo...

The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) has approved Rogers' acquisition of Shaw's broadcasting services, subject to a number of conditions and modifications. The CRTC has also set out several safeguards to ensure that the transaction benefits Canadians and the Canadian broadcasting system. As part of this transaction...

According to The Globe & Mail, Xplornet has entered negotiations on a potential purchase of Shaw Communications' Freedom Mobile division, as Rogers Communications looks at options for offloading Freedom to gain regulatory clearance for its proposed takeover of Shaw. TeleGeography says that New Brunswick-based Xplornet is Canada's largest specia...

Telecommunications operators, managed service providers (MSPs) and enterprise corporations, can simulate synthetic real-time communications, between the first to last hop, and every hop in between, of a network delivery path in order to determine the actual Next Hop Performance (NHP). Using Raspberry Pi hardware with Infosim® StableNet® unified management system allows for a cost effective agent technology to measure network perfromance Types of Use So let us take a look at some of the...

If you’re implementing IPTV, it’s important to know what metrics to monitor to ensure the transmission of high quality video. Managing performance entails more than tracking response time. Let’s look at the key metrics for managing IPTV in the following table: Performance AreaMetricDescriptionIPTV Service MetricsQoEVideo quality of experience measured via Media Delivery Index (MDI), most often displayed as two numbers separated by a colon: delay factor (DF) and the media loss rate (MLR)Packet lo...

Canadian cableco and mobile operator Eastlink yesterday announced the commercial launch of a 5G network initially spanning 18 cell sites in Halifax, Nova Scotia. The network, based on Ericsson RAN technology, will be expanded 'in the months ahead', Eastlink's press release stated. Jeanette Irekvist, Head of Customer Unit Canada for Ericsson North A...

Reuters, quoting an unnamed source cited by The Globe & Mail, reports that Canadian investment firm Globalive Capital has offered to buy Shaw Communications' Freedom Mobile division for CAD3.75 billion (USD2.9 billion), as Rogers Communications looks at options for offloading Freedom to gain regulatory clearance for its proposed takeover of Sha...

Bloomberg reports that Rogers Communications has opened a data room and begun talks with potential buyers of the mobile assets of Shaw Communications as the two Canadian groups attempt to gain regulatory approval for their CAD16 billion (USD12.5 billion) plus-debt merger deal, according to an unnamed source. TeleGeography notes that on 3 March 2022...

Rogers Communications has extended its 5G network to ten additional communities in Eastern Ontario as part of a CAD300 million (USD234 million) partnership with the Eastern Ontario Regional Network (EORN), the Government of Canada and the Province of Ontario to bridge the digital divide and bring reliable cellular connectivity across the region. Th...