Today marks the first anniversary of wireless number portability in the U.S. – an option used by about 8.5 million people to switch carriers. Of that total, 732,000 apparently gave up their home service to go completely wireless. Given there are about 170 million wireless users in the U.S., LNP has been far from the mayhem the carriers were worried about.
Here in Canada, LNP portability isn't even on the radar screen – an issue that will no doubt please ARPU-happy carriers. In informal chats with the CRTC, there is little call for among consumers. As a result, LNP is low on the priority list, if it exists as a priority at all.
LNP is another example of the philosophical differences taken by telecom regulators in the U.S. and Canada. Given this situation, it will very interesting to see how the CRTC comes down on Internet telephony in light of the FCC's decision to adopt a laissez-faire approach.

There's been plenty o' Nortel coverage but this story is the absolute best -
and most entertaining – I've seen in ages. Read and enjoy:
Nov. 23 (Bloomberg) – Nortel Networks Corp. board member John Manley said he's “very optimistic” that the telephone- equipment maker will file arestatement of its financial reports within the 30 to 60 day deadline itset on Nov. 11.
The reports that will be prepared for filing by Brampton, Ontario-based Nortel are more than 2,000 pages with over 8,000 numbers, Manley, who joined Nortel's board in May, said in an interview.
“People can't work any harder than they are,” said Manley, a former deputy prime minister of Canada. “The limiting factor is there's a lot of numbers. Everything has to be right this time. We can't revise them again.”
And to think that Manley was Canada's Finance Minister. Makes you think that perhaps the federal government's accounting system is much less complicated than Nortel's.

Ericsson Canada did a survey recently that suggests 63% of Canadians between
the ages of 15 and 69 have a wireless phone. The company got this number by
interviewing 2,000 people.
What's troubling about it is Ericsson's decision to ignore widely-accepted
industry standards when it comes to wireless penetration. If it had gone
that route, the real penetration rate would have been about 46%.
So what's Ericsson thinking? Why are they trying to pull a fast one over on
everyone? Are they simply trying to get some media attention? Are they
trying to convince the federal government the wireless industry in Canada is
healthy, and allowing the Rogers-Microcell acquisition will not harm
competition?
Regardless of Ericsson's motives, it has been a successful PR exercise given
the fawning coverage in today's Globe and Mail, and widespread radio spots.
The problem, however, is Ericsson is manipulating data to serve its own
purposes. They are producing misleading information, and that's just wrong.

There has been so much written about Internet telephony in Canada, it's hard to believe there are only about 25,000 consumers actually using the service. The market, however, could get a jump-start now that Vonage has launched an aggressive marketing campaign to mark its “official” entry into the market. If Vonage spends a small part of the US$105-million it raised earlier this year on marketing in Canada, it could educate the market enough to spark some serious growth. NRI/Michael Sohn Associates expects there will be 1.1 million residential households using an Internet telephony service by 2007. That's an ambitious number but Michael Sone believes it's achieveable once the technology gets easier to use and people learn more about it. I've got my reservations about whether this optimism is realistic – mostly because local phone service in Canada is so inexpensive it leaves little room for VOIP players to come in under the competition on price.
Speaking of Vonage, some back of the napkin calculations suggest it may be worth as much as US$2-billion. It makes some sense if you consider 8×8 Inc. has 28,000 subscribers, third-quarter revenue of US$2.5 million and a market capitalization of $144-million. Compare that with Vonage's annual revenue of US$120-million, 300,000 customers and a takeover/IPO premium, and the idea of US$2-billion is not that much of a reach. When this figure was thrown at Vonage CEO Jeff Citron, he declined to comment but had a smile on his face much like a cat looks like after he's swallowed the canary. Citron is well on his way to scoring yet another start-up jackpot. He may not be the best company builder around but he sure knows a fertile investment opportunity.

I wrote a column in yesterday's National Post in which I argued that trading in Nortel Networks should be suspended and that analysts covering the company were doing their clients a disservice because they were working with incomplete financial information.
Turns out perhaps that thesis was a bit rash, although it had the right intentions. Suspending trading, while in theory a solid idea until Nortel gets its house in order, would be unworkable given there are more than 4 billion shares out there. Forcing people to wait on the sidelines until this accounting and management debacle works itself out is probably not the best scenario.
As for analysts, they are doing a job they would refer not to do. That said, you have to believe clients, brokers and Nortel are expecting them to slog it out until the bitter end. As someone told me told, “It's not like they can stop writing simply because there isn't enough information”. So, I say “my bad” to all those hard working analysts out there. It's a crappy job but someone's got to do it.

Not sure about Michael Sone's thesis but in a new report he expects the number of residential customers using Internet telephony will soar to more than 1.1 million by 2007 from 29,000 at the end of this year. At first blush, this seems like an over-the-top bullish target given there does not seem to be a huge groundswell of interest in Internet telephony currently. Perhaps Sone believes the entry of players such as Bell Canada will convince people to give up their circuit-switch phones. Another factor could be the price-cap regime, which comes up for renewal in 2006. If the CRTC lifts the price limitations on local service, it could give Internet telephony the room it needs to get a large market foothold.