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November 16, 2010, 3:33 PM EST
By Hugo Miller
(Updates with comment from BCE in eighth paragraph.)
Nov. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Rogers Communications Inc., Canada’s largest wireless carrier, said it would consider opportunities for sharing network development costs with other cable and telecommunications companies as it tests new technology.
“We would look at the options for sure,” Chief Executive Officer Nadir Mohamed said today at a conference in Toronto. “We see ourselves in the leadership position.”
Rogers began trials for a new long-term evolution, or LTE, network last month that would offer faster Web browsing and accommodate an expected increase in smartphone traffic. Sharing network construction costs would save Rogers money as it aims to fend off competition from four new local wireless operators.
BCE Inc. and Telus Corp., Toronto-based Rogers’s two biggest rivals, built a faster network together last year which allowed them to introduce the iPhone and end Rogers’s Canadian monopoly on the Apple Inc. device.
In October, Rogers said its "modest" increase in mobile- phone subscribers on contracts last quarter was due in part to "heightened competitive intensity." Rogers continues to expect “reasonable” growth but nowhere near the growth of the past two or three years, as competition has increased, Mohamed said.
Rogers rose 7 cents to C$36.91 at 2:34 p.m. in Toronto Stock Exchange trading as BCE added 10 cents to C$33.19. Rogers and BCE had gained 14 percent this year before today.
Wireless Auction
BCE added more wireless subscribers last quarter than analysts estimated, helping the Montreal-based company to report a 1.3 percent increase in sales to C$4.52 billion.
“We have to maintain the wireless momentum that we have as that’s the key revenue driver,” BCE CEO George Cope said at the Toronto conference today.
The Canadian government’s next auction for wireless spectrum, or mobile-device airwaves, must be “wide open” to give the incumbents -- and not just the new carriers -- the opportunity to tap its profit potential, Cope said.
“We’re going through spectrum at an unbelievable pace because of video,” Cope said. “It’s going to be a great revenue generator.”
--Editors: Ville Heiskanen, Chris Staiti
BCE CN CN T CN CN RCI/B CN CN BCE CN CN
To contact the reporter on this story: Hugo Miller in Toronto at hugomiller@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Peter Elstrom at pelstrom@bloomberg.net
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(Updates with comment from BCE in eighth paragraph.)
Nov. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Rogers Communications Inc., Canada’s largest wireless carrier, said it would consider opportunities for sharing network development costs with other cable and telecommunications companies as it tests new technology.
“We would look at the options for sure,” Chief Executive Officer Nadir Mohamed said today at a conference in Toronto. “We see ourselves in the leadership position.”
Rogers began trials for a new long-term evolution, or LTE, network last month that would offer faster Web browsing and accommodate an expected increase in smartphone traffic. Sharing network construction costs would save Rogers money as it aims to fend off competition from four new local wireless operators.
BCE Inc. and Telus Corp., Toronto-based Rogers’s two biggest rivals, built a faster network together last year which allowed them to introduce the iPhone and end Rogers’s Canadian monopoly on the Apple Inc. device.
In October, Rogers said its "modest" increase in mobile- phone subscribers on contracts last quarter was due in part to "heightened competitive intensity." Rogers continues to expect “reasonable” growth but nowhere near the growth of the past two or three years, as competition has increased, Mohamed said.
Rogers rose 7 cents to C$36.91 at 2:34 p.m. in Toronto Stock Exchange trading as BCE added 10 cents to C$33.19. Rogers and BCE had gained 14 percent this year before today.
Wireless Auction
BCE added more wireless subscribers last quarter than analysts estimated, helping the Montreal-based company to report a 1.3 percent increase in sales to C$4.52 billion.
“We have to maintain the wireless momentum that we have as that’s the key revenue driver,” BCE CEO George Cope said at the Toronto conference today.
The Canadian government’s next auction for wireless spectrum, or mobile-device airwaves, must be “wide open” to give the incumbents -- and not just the new carriers -- the opportunity to tap its profit potential, Cope said.
“We’re going through spectrum at an unbelievable pace because of video,” Cope said. “It’s going to be a great revenue generator.”
--Editors: Ville Heiskanen, Chris Staiti
BCE CN CN T CN CN RCI/B CN CN BCE CN CN
To contact the reporter on this story: Hugo Miller in Toronto at hugomiller@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Peter Elstrom at pelstrom@bloomberg.net
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