The latest OECD broadband numbers [ Excel, 47 KB] show that Canada leads the world in cable broadband penetration, with 14.89 subscribers per 100 people, as of June 2008.

Will this statistic be reported anywhere else?

Canada has maintained its position in overall broadband penetration – at number 10. As I have written before, since Canadian household size is larger than the OECD average, there are problems with the OECD numbers, which show connections per 100 people, not connections per 100 households.

The OECD did produce a table of “Percentage of households with broadband access” [ Excel, 37.5 KB] , but the data is incomplete. Using 2005 numbers (the last complete year of statistics), Canada ranks 6th, behind Korea, Japan, Iceland, Netherlands and Denmark.

Although a report we have seen is saying that Canada’s performance in broadband penetration doesn’t compare well against Australia, we beg to differ. In 2005, Australia had only a quarter of its homes connected using broadband; Canada had more than half.

Canada has to work on improving broadband affordability for its under served population. But for today, let’s celebrate being number 1.

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Update [October 28, 8:40 pm]
Peter Nowak’s covers the story at CBC Online. One of the comments on his story doesn’t understand the relevance of the leadership in cable penetration rates.

Wot? A high ratio of cable to DSL is considered meaningful? They’re simply two ways to provide the same service.

Of course, my readers didn’t comment about this point because you understand that strong cable internet is evidence of the level of competitiveness in the retail internet market. 

How will telecom carriers be impacted by the global economic conditions?

There are a few news items from the past week that present a variety of perspectives.

According to the Globe and Mail and CTV, Solutions Research Group has a study that indicates that consumers view their mobile phones and internet services as essentials. Canadians will give up other expenses, such as dining out, concerts and movies before dropping these communications expenses.

However, premium cable and residential wireline phone service ranked number 5 and 7 among targets for savings in family budgets, so it isn’t an entirely rosy picture for the major carriers.

Many consumers, with minor exceptions, view these as essential utilities, like water or electricity

Another news item presents a different perspective, examining enterprise purchases of communications services.

Telephony reports that Level 3 believes that its current sales slowdown is disconnected from underlying demand. According to James Crowe, the CEO of Level 3,

We believe this increase in time from identifying an opportunity to the execution of a firm order does not indicate a decrease in demand. If we’re right, you’ll see a one-time decrease [in revenue]. If two months ago, the sales cycle is 60 to 90 days, and now it’s 70 to 100 days, as that filters in, it doesn’t affect the overall demand or pipeline — if we’re accurate.

That is a big “if.”

In its earnings conference call last week, AT&T reported some softness in enterprise voice and data, but said

We continue to deliver high-teens growth in enterprise IP data revenues. Sales flow was solid and a number of major contracts signed in recent months are beginning to ramp.

In his closing comments, AT&T’s CFO Richard Lindner said that in obviously challenging times, he believes it prudent to be conservative, to manage and reduce expenses, and to be disciplined with capital investment and to preserve cash.

With these events as context, we saw Shaw announce that it is not planning to move ahead as quickly as some of the other AWS spectrum holders.

How will other carriers respond to changes in demand for their portfolio of services?

Former New Brunswick premier Bernard Lord has been named president of the Canadian Wireless Telecom Association.

He led the New Brunswick with two successive majorities from 1999 to 2006 and was most recently Senior Counsel at McCarthy Tétrault.

The Association is responsible for representing the wireless industry to the government and various regulatory agencies, such as the CRTC. Issues include use of spectrum, the use of mobile technology in cars, tower location and other areas of industry-wide advocacy.

The story first broke yesterday in papers in eastern Canada. The Saint John Telegraph Journal wrote:

Lord was premier for seven years and is close to Prime Minister Stephen Harper and well-known to many of the MPs formerly in cabinet or likely to be appointed.

Lord most recently served as one of three co-chairs of the federal Conservative party campaign.

Among the challenges for the new association leader will be recruitment of new members – welcoming the new AWS spectrum holders under the industry’s umbrella. While the new entrants may harbour some resentment for the CWTA’s lobbying during the spectrum consultation, there are many issues for which the common interests of the industry should unite all of the players.

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Update [October 24, 9:20 pm]
Peter Nowak’s story at CBC Online includes a segment on why the new entrants should join the CWTA:

Industry analysts said newcomers would have much to gain by joining the CWTA.

“They’re concerned with future spectrum concerns, the ability to build towers and ensuring that legislation for driving and using cellphones is done with full knowledge instead of emotion,” said telecommunications consultant Mark Goldberg. “All of this can be done with so much more credibility if presented on an industry-wide basis.”

Technorati Tags:
CWTA, Bernard Lord

Last week, CBC broke a story about a “recent” study out of Dal that purports to show that hands-free phone use while driving is just as dangerous as hand-held.

The study, which was a review of existing literature, was actually released more than 4 months ago at a conference in Whistler: the 18th Canadian Multidisciplinary Road Safety Conference. Having looked at that paper and some of the underlying primary research, I began to wonder if the conclusion is a little bit misleading.

The body of literature really seems to be pointing to a broader problem: driving while distracted – distractions coming from many sources. Some papers (for example and this example) refer to distractions caused by being engaged in conversations – even those with someone else in the car.

No one is suggesting that we should ban travel with passengers in the car, although the research seems to be clear that drivers are going to be distracted by conversing with the people in the car. We have all experienced the distractions associated with crying kids in the backseat, over-exuberant and rambunctious sports teams in the carpool, shared map reading.

We don’t see legislation being proposed to mandate driving alone. We even have special car pool lanes, giving privileges to those drivers most likely to be distracted!

By demonstrating that there is no difference between hand-held and hands-free, is it possible that the Dalhousie study is actually showing that there is no difference between any kind of cell phone use and conversations with passengers in the car?

Does this raise questions about whether legislation that targets only mobile phone use is missing the mark?

Technorati Tags:
driving, mobile phones, hand-held, hands-free

Videotron announced its mobile network plans Wednesday morning, saying that it has awarded its network build to Nokia Siemens Networks.

Videotron plans to spend another $250M building its network over the next 12-18 months and it will roll-out price leading mobile services. Peter Nowak at CBC has a number of the details from the announcement.

I thought that the discussion of leveraging Quebecor’s stable of media assets holds the greatest promise for customers, beyond the expected price savings. Videotron is characterizing their network as 3.75 G – nearly a 4th generation wireless network. They plan to be technology leaders in mobile, just as they have led in cable internet speeds and cable-based telephony. As such, their ability to offer a package of broadband content at home and on-the-go holds a great deal of promise for consumers.

I think back to the days when Videotron first launched telephone service. Recall that Quebec had among the lowest penetration rates for cable TV. Voice was a way to pull through cable subscriptions. Their mobile services resale helped complete the basic voice/TV/IP bundle, as we noted two years ago.

From what I heard, it sounds like Videotron is now moving to the next level of converged content delivery, with a vision to develop a distribution platform for its print and broadcast media to be as available on the go as it is at home.

The second thrust of our business model is the repurposing and dissemination of this content on an unprecedented number of media. Just as print content will be accessible in the virtual universe, purely digital creations will be accessible on more conventional media. And I see no limits to these creations and this content, be it in the field of information, art, entertainment or sport.

Telecommunications, print and the Internet will no longer be separate, self-enclosed worlds but rather platforms that readily allow for movement between them.

I suspect this is a preview of messages that Videotron will deliver to the CRTC’s New Media proceeding.