The BC Association of Broadcasters (BCAB) 72nd Annual Conference is underway in Victoria. This year’s event got underway with the President’s Welcome Reception Wednesday evening. Thursday’s speakers lineup includes Nlogic’s David Phillips on “How Broadcasters Can Be Audaciously Hopeful”; media strategist Fred Jacobs on “the A-Z’s of Transformation”; Jeff Vidler of Audience Insights Inc. who’ll present a focus group providing insight into the consumer habits of Generation X; in addition to Broadcast Dialogue publisher Shawn Smith.
Corus Entertainment has established two scholarships for Calgary journalism students, named in honour of two late Corus Calgary staff members. The Global News Peter Watts Bursary at Mount Royal University is named for the former TSN and Corus Radio broadcaster. Watts was most recently host of the Alberta Morning News for 20 years before passing away at age 68 this past January. Another scholarship at SAIT has been set up in the name of alumnus John Himpe, who also passed away suddenly in January at age 38. Himpe worked for Rawlco’s Saskatchewan stations off and on for 15 years, before joining 770 CHQR in 2017 as a reporter and producer.
The CRTC says despite making progress towards gender parity in the Canadian film and television production industry, research shows that women still face barriers to career advancement, particularly in key creative positions. With the objective of finding lasting solutions to ensure more women play leading roles in the industry, the CRTC brought together the country’s largest public and private broadcasters who agreed to voluntary action plans to address the issue. The plans of each participating organization have been published: Bell Media; Blue Ant Media; CBC/Radio-Canada; Corus Entertainment; WildBrain (formerly DHX); Rogers Media; and TVA Group (French only). The CRTC says its next step will be to engage with smaller and independent broadcasters to see how they can voluntarily contribute to the collective goal of increasing women’s access to key positions.
Telus has agreed to acquire ADT Security Services Canada, Inc. (ADT Canada) for approximately $700 million. One of Canada’s leading providers of security and automation solutions for residential and business customers, ADT boasts approximately 500,000 customers and 1,000 employees across the country. Telus said in a release that the acquisition builds on its strategy to leverage its wireless and PureFibre networks, and expands its security business and its health strategy which includes remote patient care and home health monitoring. Telus says it expects to add more than 12,000 new customer additions to its security business in the third quarter of 2019, bringing its total security subscriber base to approximately 100,000, prior to the acquisition of ADT Canada. The transaction is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2019, pending regulatory approval.
The Federal Court of Appeal has temporarily frozen an Aug. 15 CRTC order that forced the big telco operators to cut the wholesale rate it charges smaller resellers to use their internet bandwidth. The Federal Court is deciding whether it will hear a challenge brought forward by BCE, Rogers, Telus, Shaw, Quebecor and Bragg Communications (the parent company of Eastlink).
Xplornet Communications is offering unlimited data plans for its satellite internet customers in rural Canada.The new DataXtend unlimited data plans are available to current and new satellite customers in every province on Xplornet’s satellite broadband network, at all speed levels. Earlier this year, Xplornet announced unlimited data plans across its national 4G fixed wireless broadband network.
Rogers has announced it’s opening a new B.C. customer solution centre in Kelowna. The new centre will initially employ 350 people with the local workforce projected to grow to 500 over time. Rogers says the facility will handle roughly one million Rogers and Fido customer interactions each year. Located on Dickson Avenue, it will occupy 32,000 square feet in Kelowna’s Landmark District. Renovations will begin in early 2020 with the site opening in summer 2020. Hiring will take place next spring. Over the last 18 months, Rogers grew its customer solution specialist workforce by over 1,000 team members.
Eric Blais, Director, Customer Success at StatsRadio, is out with his newest Rethinking Media column. In this month’s column, he asks questions like is content still king in an increasingly crowded content landscape? And why we’ll see a growing number of fractured, hard-to-measure audiences. Read more here.
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