Mégantic—L’Érable MP Christian Paradis was named Industry Minister earlier today and many will be watching how he approaches a number of active issues for new information industries, as he transitions from his former role as Minister of Natural Resources.

Network World asked for my initial impressions of the cabinet and I observed that we could see delays as the new Minister gets acquainted with the files.

With the Globalive court hearing today, I have been reflecting on an interview I had with Canadian Press last year when Minister Clement launched his consultation on liberalizing foreign investment in telecom.

Industry analyst Mark Goldberg, who also organizes the telecom summit, praised the government’s initiative but also said it is prudent to quickly advance the plan, because the leaving the future uncertain could actually hurt all of the carriers.

“Once you open a process and there’s uncertainty as to which direction is going to be followed, it creates an overhang for the capital markets. The ability of companies to raise capital during that interim period of uncertainty can’t be overstated,” he said.

“It could be extremely damaging to small players and large players alike to have a lengthy period of uncertainty when you’ve got such a capital intensive business.”

And here we are a year later with no progress on the file other than having been needlessly linked to the 700 MHz spectrum auction and a second round of consultations on the same issue. It has to be frustrating for Globalive, Allstream and others who thought there would have been more action to settle the foreign investment question.

Welcome Minister Paradis to the digital economy. Reactivate that @christianparad Twitter account. We’re ready for you to jump right in to lead a comprehensive national strategy.

Continuing the discussion of the various panels at The 2011 Canadian Telecom Summit, I want to look at the session being moderated by Evan Kelly, PwC’s National Communications Practice Leader, who has been a great supporter of our event and with whom I have had the pleasure to collaborate on a few projects through the years. The Evolution of Consumer Communications: Compete or Collaborate panel will explore the evolving world of applications, content and services and how traditional business models are changing. It will be an interesting panel, with some interesting and diverse views of where the future may be heading for consumer services business models.

The panel features

• Lori Bieda from SAS
• Paul Brannen from Samsung
• Vikas Gupta from TransGaming
• Caleb Rubin from Rogers

The 2011 Canadian Telecom Summit is May 31 to June 2 in Toronto. It is less than two weeks away. Have you registered yet?

The future of mobile wireless is LTE and that will be the subject of a panel discussion at The 2011 Canadian Telecom Summit, which gets started just 2 weeks from today, on May 31 in Toronto. The LTE panel will feature some of the world’s most important suppliers of the hardware and software technologies that power next generation wireless services.

A number of Canada’s wireless carriers are already engaged in trials of LTE and some have announced service could launch later this year. If these developments are of interest to you, you will be interested in attending the panel at The 2011 Canadian Telecom Summit, LTE: The Future of Mobile, featuring

• Nokia Siemens Networks Canada CTO & Head of Services, Petri Lyytikainen
• Ericsson Canada CTO, Dragan Nerandzic
• Huawei Wireless Global CTO, Wen Tong
• Oracle Communications Director, Leonard Sheahan
• Acision SVP, Mobile Broadband, Steven van Zanen

The May 31 morning panel will be moderated by Natasha Tamaskar from GENBAND. The panel will be able to explore the capabilities and requirements for the next phase of wireless evolution, helping to provide context for the Wireless Broadband session that was the subject of yesterday’s blog posting.

The 2011 Canadian Telecom Summit is May 31 to June 2 in Toronto. It is only two weeks away. Have you registered yet?

The 2011 Canadian Telecom Summit opens in just 2 weeks, on May 31 in Toronto. Wireless broadband and the 700 MHz spectrum auction are certain to figure prominently in the discussions at this year’s event.

Continuing with the theme of last week’s postings, I’ll focus on another of the panels at The 2011 Canadian Telecom Summit, Wireless Broadband: Our insatiable thirst for spectrum.

The panel features

• TeraGo President & CEO, Bryan Boyd
• Sandvine President & CEO, Dave Caputo
• Qualcomm VP Government Affairs, Dean Brenner
• Rogers VP Regulatory, Dawn Hunt
• Xplornet Chief Strategy Officer, Allison Lenehan

The panel will be moderated by Mark Lowenstein, who is the Managing Director of Mobile Ecosystem. It is a session that will cover a range of issues: fixed versus mobile; urban versus rural; managing traffic and expanding capacity. With participation from both sides of the border, we’ll be looking for broader perspectives on this important component of Canada’s national digital network connectivity.

The 2011 Canadian Telecom Summit is May 31 to June 2 in Toronto. Have you registered yet?

Yesterday, the White House announced its proposal to enhance cybersecurity for the United States, including new rules for disclosure of breeches of personal information security by companies. What are the implications for Canadians and Canadian companies operating in the US? How do Canadian rules and practices measure up? The answers will be explored by the Privacy and Security panel at The 2011 Canadian Telecom Summit, which opens on May 31 in Toronto.

Privacy and Security: Guarding Information in a Transparent World will look at these issues with a diverse range of speakers who can share deep expertise in these issues.

The panel features

• Canada’s Privacy Commissioner Jennifer Stoddart
• HP – Arcsight CTO (and former National Security Agency CIO/CTO) Dr. Prescott Winter
• Paypal Canada GM Darrell MacMullin
• Rogers VP for Enterprise Risk Management Don Huff

The panel will be moderated by David Craig, who leads the National Information Security Practice at PwC. It is a session that shouldn’t be missed.

The 2011 Canadian Telecom Summit is May 31 to June 2 in Toronto. Have you registered yet?