FCC Chair Kevin Martin is blaming municipalities in the US for rising cable rates, saying that they are restricting competitive entry by others.
Score 1 for the CRTC.
A couple weeks ago, I wrote about the distressing lack of courtesy in web traffic. I was pleased to receive some kind compliments on that post, beginning to restore my image of self-worth.
It is interesting that the theme has been covered up by a couple writers over the past couple days: David Pogue in the NY Times and Rob Hyndman.
One of Rob’s commenters speaks of living in PEI and the requisite courtesy in driving and everyday life “under the assumption that you are known by many of the people around you”.
When we lived in New Jersey, we experienced unexpected lows in customer service and rudeness. We attributed the phenomena to living in the shadow of New York. With 25 million people in the region, stores and service people didn’t seem to care about repeat business – there are always 24,999,999 suckers still out there to rip-off. People didn’t care about being rude because, after all, what are the chances of seeing someone again?
Nothing like getting a NJ salute on the Garden State Parkway, getting passed by a blue-haired lady!
At long last, The Venice Project has launched its beta. This is the latest offering from Skype founders Janus Friis and Niklas Zennstrom. Business Week has written about it and the beta was just released on a limited scale.
I’ll be test driving it and I’ll let you know what I think.
Initial impression is quite positive. Very, very good picture and sound quality, especially in view of the standard high speed connection I am using.
They don’t want to lower prices for customers generally. What they really want to do is pick off the customers that have gone over to the competition, call them the very next day, offer them $100, $200 if they come back, and that way they send a message to the new entrant saying don’t bother being aggressive
Is that a realistic scenario? Rogers and Shaw have been able to enjoy ‘disciplined pricing’ for their local phone services so far and both have grabbed sizable shares of the market in the regions in which they offer service.
Among the cable companies, Videotron has demonstrated aggressive pricing that still appears to deliver profitable returns.
In any case, the cable companies have been expecting forbearance for the ILECs anyway. The telcos are close to the 25% in many major markets. The incremental ARPU is likely too attractive to leave alone.
So what is behind the statement that smaller cable firms may avoid launching voice services altogether?
>Over the past 3 days, Canada’s major telecom carriers provided their guidance for the coming year: Tuesday was Bell (TSX: BCE); Wednesday was MTS Allstream (TSX: MBT); and, Thursday was TELUS (TSX: T).
You can read the regular newspapers to decipher the financial forecasts, or read the reports that each of the major financial houses are issuing with their updated forecasts for the sector.
Income trusts, how much longer they will defer payment of taxes, dividends, share buybacks, increasing shareholder value, improved focus, receptive to Monday’s regulatory reforms. But you need to look beyond the common themes to try to understand what is happening in the battles between them.
Although TELUS has been viewed as having the greater exposure to higher growth in wireless, it now seems to be feeling competitive pressures in that sector, lowering its forecasts for year end 2006 as I described in yesterday’s post. Bell’s overall guidance for earnings growth (~5%) is substantially the same as that for TELUS, with benefits arising from its investments in its sometimes painful systems and process re-engineering efforts.
Of the three carriers setting objectives this week, only Bell conducted its review meeting live, providing analysts with an opportunity to chat with the company executives and each other. MTS Allstream had a conference call and webcast that was held with the CEO and his operating presidents as well as the CFO. In the case of TELUS, it was all finance – just the CFO by phone and webcast, having to address questions that may have been better answered by business unit heads.
I know this industry is all about telecommunications. But the ‘next best thing to being there’ is just not the same as actually being there.
Gold medal to Bell. The silver goes to MTS Allstream for making it clear that the business units are signed up to the guidance. TELUS has received recognition for disclosure and governance, but would the awards be jeopardized if its operating executives were on hand to demonstrate ownership of and commitment to the forecasts set out in the 2007 business plan?
Call me old fashioned, if you want, but there is much to be said about the chance to see the expressions on the faces and share the kibbitzing over coffee.