SpectrumI copied this from the Winnipeg Free Press Website:
MTS given means to expand wireless service
Licences allow telecommunications firm to upgrade technology
Sat, Feb 3, 2001
By Murray McNeill
MANITOBANS will soon have access to a broader range of wireless voice and data services as a result of Manitoba Telecom Services' acquisition of new spectrum licences.
The Winnipeg-based telecommunications company acquired the new Personal Communications Services (PCS) licences from Bell Mobility, which successfully bid on 20 such licences during a three-week-long Industry Canada auction which ended earlier this week.
The new licences give MTS an additional 10 megahertz of spectrum -- bands of air space through which telecommunications signals can be transmitted.
It not only gives the company the extra air space it needs to handle more cell phone calls and wireless data transmissions, but also enables it to begin offering emerging new third generation wireless voice and data services, Roger Ballance, executive vice-president of sales and marketing for MTS Communications Inc., said yesterday.
Ballance said the new 3G wireless services include such things as higher-speed data services and new multimedia services. The latter could include things like video gaming or services which incorporate graphics or video clips.
"I think wireless customers are going to be treated to some interesting new applications that will change the way they do business and change their personal lives," he said.
Ballance said MTS will phase in the new services over the next two to three years with the first likely to be launched within as little as three months.
The new licences obtained by Bell Mobility, which is a partner with MTS and several other telecommunication companies in the Bell Wireless Alliance, will also enable MTS to join forces with Bell to offer wireless telecommunications services in Alberta and British Columbia.
The two companies already offer an array of business telecommunication services in those markets through a joint venture called Bell Intrigna. Ballance said the partners may offer the new wireless services through Bell Intrigna or they may opt to create a separate new wireless communications firm.
"Within the next two to three months we should have more news to share on that," he said.
Ballance agreed that expansion of its wireless operations should lead to higher revenues and net earnings for MTS in the coming years.
On Thursday, MTS announced record net earnings for 2000 of $100.5 million (not $108.1 million as reported in yesterday's Free Press).
The record results drew the ire yesterday of Harold Dyck, an official with the Social Planning Council of Winnipeg.
Dyck questioned how MTS can justify appearing before a Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission hearing last month seeking another $3-per-month increase in its local telephone rates when it's already ringing up record profits.
Dyck argued that another $3 hike means some of Winnipeg's poor will no longer be able to afford to have a phone in their homes.
"I think there's something very wrong with this picture," he said. "Some people are coming into windfall profits form their shares in MTS and some other people are suffering."
However, Ballance said if MTS hopes to attract new capital investment from shareholders, it has to produce the kind of returns that other telecommunication companies are producing. If it doesn't, shareholders will take their money elsewhere.
"So the answer really is that we have to be competitive with respect to shareholders as well as consumers," he said.