Telecom Trends

Leading up to Industry Canada's release of the list of qualified bidders on Monday evening, there had been considerable speculation about which applicants had the support of global players. Some were certain that AT&T or T-Mobile were behind certain bids. Other names were circulated as documented in Peter Nowak's story on CBC.

As the dust settled Monday, there is certainly foreign capital getting involved in the auction, but no evidence yet of major brands lending their marketing experience, buying power or names to any of bidders.

The equity markets breathed a big sigh of relief with incumbents Rogers and Telus seeing nice gains on their stock prices.

The reality is that it may not be smart for a serious partner to declare their intentions, yet. The Industry Canada rules for the auction may make it more advantageous for carriers to be sitting back at this stage. There is plenty of time to pounce later.

For now, there are a number of possible new national carriers to emerge, plus a collection of regional or niche players. At least 6 bidders have sufficient bid points to try to acquire 20 MHz coast to coast, including Globalive, Shaw, MTS Allstream, Videotron, DAVE Wireless and 6934579.

It seems to me that last company, 6934579, a partnership to be funded by Novacap Technologies, is going to need a better name or alternatively, will they adapt the song Jenny by Tommy Tutone for their ads?

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Industry Canada, AWS Auction