Canadian spectrum auction brings in the bacon

The Canadian spectrum auction has hit twice its estimate of $1.5bn (£700m), and the bidding is raging on as newcomers and incumbents vie for control of the airwaves. The auction has been running since May 27, and includes 105MHz of spectrum in two 45MHz chunks starting at 1710MHz and 2110MHz as well as some odds and ends …

[Brad]

Bring it on

because I'm tired of this virtual monopoly we have now

[Trevor Pott]

"New entrants"

Which probably means "Shaw" or "Aliant" entering the cell phone market in some sort attempt at triple/quad play.

Oh dear God.

The Horror.

Dead vulture: becuase this is the state of innovation in the Canadian telecommunications market.

[Michael Willems]

Competition in Canada? Joke.

I have the misfortune -from a telecoms point of view - to live in Canada. Medieaval, I almost say. No competition. My Blackberry bill is around $500 a month and I am not a heavy users: a week long trip to the UK is good for another $500-$1,000. There is no unlimited GSM bandwidth here - monthly allowed bandwidth for $100 is measured in MB, not GB!

And then when I travel it is even worse: $0,01 per kB, with a minimum of 10 kB.

Ripoff, and the "new entrants" all have to be Canadian. And those frequencies are not used anywhere else, so forget any international equipment being useable.

So in effect there is zero competition.

If US carriers were allowed into Canada, traffic costs would go down 90% or more in a year. But oh no, our Tory government has to protect its Telco friends. At the expense of the Canadian people and worse, Canadian competitiveness. Sad.