Telecom Trends

The impact on the Canadian Amp'd operation is probably minimal, but it could depend on the specifics of the deal between it and Telus.

Should Amp'd successfully restructure and continue as an MVNO, there is no impact on customers.

Should it restructure as a pure content play (i.e., set up a situation in the US closer to that in Canada where the carrier is responsible for the mobile service), then there is likely no impact on customers.

Should Amp'd simply fail, the likely outcome in the US would be for Verizon to take over the customer base. The impact in Canada would be even less because Telus already manages the customer relationship. Although, customers would lose the unique Amp'd content.

I wouldn't bet on a restructuring. They've apparently burned through almost all of $360M on investments as well as having $100M in trade debt. The enormous marketing spend (along with reported churn and bad debt issues) was probably part of the problem, but more important is that a high-end, niche MVNO may just not be financially viable.

To survive, they need someone prepared to pump a lot more money into the company and they need Verizon to play along. The Chapter 11 filing itself is likely sufficient to give Verizon the option to pull out of the agreement. As the network supplier and largest creditor, they have a lot of leverage right now and may just decide it's not worth the hassle.
 

Interesting question - I don't know what the Amp'd Canada acquisition rate has been like since the launch in Canada, but their Canadian monthly service fees are significantly higher than the standard wireless fees from the Big 3. In the US, their ARPU is close to $230 USD/month.... I can't believe they aren't able to stay afloat with revenues like that.

-jules