Rogers' VOIP Plans
The big question in the Canadian VOIP market these days is when Rogers will launch its cable telephony service. CEO Ted Rogers has talked about July 1, which is the 20th anniversary of Rogers Wireless, but Rogers' PR folks are sticking a “mid-summer” timeframe. UBS Securities met with Rogers COO Nadir Mohamed yesterday, who heads up the company's cable and wireless divisions. UBS believes Rogers will roll out telephony in a few weeks, and push digital cable and phone service as a way to maximize each truck roll. UBS also expects Rogers will price its telephone service at an “attractive discount” between (Shaw $55 a month and Videotron ($15.95 to $30 a month). I've got Rogers high-speed and cable so it will be interesting to see what kind of deal Ted's going to offer me. Something in the $30 a month range with Web-based features (voice-mail to e-mail, easy ways to configure services such as call-answer and call-forwarding) and a healthy amount of LD would probably lure me away from Sprint.
June 28th, 2005 at 9:31 am
…would probably lure me away from Sprint
Is the cannibalization of their own business offset by the fact that they're moving the customer (in this case, you) off the PSTN, which is, ultimately, owned by Bell?
Which is, ironically, owned by Rogers
June 28th, 2005 at 12:50 pm
I guess there is no way around the whole bundling issue if it represents savings from the Bells of the world. What about being locked into a contract or the fact that customers of Rogers will be dependent on one network which will deny them one of great attributes of VoIP, portability. This might change once the Rogers/ Sprint integration is completed, but for my dime, I like to travel with my number.
June 28th, 2005 at 3:10 pm
I take it Rogers will be rolling out an access-dependent service then, like Videotron, etc?
When at home (I'm not, for the summer) I am a Videotron Internet customer — locked into the 12-month agreement. It's not pretty.