Saturday, September 17, 2005
Rogers & Bell to Built Joint National Network
Posted by Jason Dunn in "NEWS" @ 12:00 AM
"Rogers Communications Inc. and Bell Canada are joining forces to build a massive $200 million national wireless network. The companies will create Inukshuk Internet Inc., a wireless broadband network expected to reach two-thirds of Canadians in less than three years...Customers will have access to voice, video streaming and data on the Internet via portable devices. Bell and Rogers will each have the right to use 50 per cent of the network's total transmission capacity. They will also compete for sales, marketing, customer care and billing."
One of the reasons why Europe has such fantastic mobile network coverage is the number of people contained in a relatively small land mass. The US has less people and more land to cover, and Canada is even worst - we have approximately 1/9th the population of the US and even more land to cover. So for anyone that thinks mobile phone coverage is bad where they live, come visit Canada, the Truth North Strong and Free...of coverage. For that reason, I greet this announcement with a lot of enthusiasm - Rogers beefed up their coverage when they purchased Fido this year, and this move looks like it will make both Rogers and Bell a national powerhouse in terms of coverage. Good news for us Canadians! Now if only they'd make their plans more generous with minutes. :roll:
UPDATE: According to Jan Innes from Rogers, whom I contacted to ask what type of network this was going to be, "It's pre-WiMAX". So it looks like this is going to be a data networking after all, and not a carrier phone network. Rogers and Bell already have many locations for cellular towers, so by adding a WiMAX radio into each of those towers, each carrier can now compete with ISPs for Internet access. It will be interesting to watch what they do with this!
One of the reasons why Europe has such fantastic mobile network coverage is the number of people contained in a relatively small land mass. The US has less people and more land to cover, and Canada is even worst - we have approximately 1/9th the population of the US and even more land to cover. So for anyone that thinks mobile phone coverage is bad where they live, come visit Canada, the Truth North Strong and Free...of coverage. For that reason, I greet this announcement with a lot of enthusiasm - Rogers beefed up their coverage when they purchased Fido this year, and this move looks like it will make both Rogers and Bell a national powerhouse in terms of coverage. Good news for us Canadians! Now if only they'd make their plans more generous with minutes. :roll:
UPDATE: According to Jan Innes from Rogers, whom I contacted to ask what type of network this was going to be, "It's pre-WiMAX". So it looks like this is going to be a data networking after all, and not a carrier phone network. Rogers and Bell already have many locations for cellular towers, so by adding a WiMAX radio into each of those towers, each carrier can now compete with ISPs for Internet access. It will be interesting to watch what they do with this!
