wifitalk.ca

The Globe and Mail reported yesterday that the CRTC is cracking down on Canadian VoIP providers who are not complying with 911 service requirements.

The story mentions that the new regulations likely mean that VoIP providers will have to offer full 911 functionality or risk being shut down. When calling 911 from anywhere in the country, your call gets routed to the emergency dispatch centre closest to you. This is how you get the police in Ottawa when you call 911 from Ottawa.

There are two types of 911 service: 911 and e-911.

With e-911, a special privacy law allows the phone system to identify a caller’s location from the billing records kept at the phone company. The phone company obviously knows where you live, so their computer tells the 911 system where you live when  you make a call right away so your call is routed quickly to the right dispatch centre. For cellular phones, the location information is based off of cell tower triangulation.

With 911 over VoIP, your IP address doesn’t identify your location (it must be kept in the billing records of the phone provider), and for mobile VoIP, your location is often not your billing address.

VoIP providers can get around this if they have their own 911 routing centre which handles all 911 calls on their network. The operator would take the call, ask for the location, then transfer the call to the appropriate dispatch centre, adding time.

GPS on modern phones could be used to solve the problem, but it is often slow to acquire a lock, and doesn’t work well indoors.

What does this mean for Skype and other potential mobile VoIP providers? They can either build their own 911 routing centre, try to rely on phone location services, or not risk the liability and not operate.

The CBC is reporting that Shaw has cancelled its plans for a nationwide cellular network, so the hopes of another new entrant into the Canadian wireless market are dashed. Citing $1B in capital expenditures and difficulty in competing with the incumbents, Shaw will forego its plans, and may decide to sell its wireless spectrum to one of the new players Wind, Mobilicity, or Public Mobile.

What’s interesting is Shaw stated that wifi is free and they can more easily set up a wifi network than a cellular network.

“Given that Wi-Fi spectrum is free and there are no device subsidies, we can build extensive Wi-Fi coverage at a substantially lower cost relative to a traditional wireless network and still provide our customers with an excellent broadband wireless experience,” Shaw said.

Maybe this means a city-blanketing wifi network that you can pay to have access to. wifi capable devices such as iPhones and iPod touches can be activated using a VOIP client similar to Shaw’s home phone, and it would work anywhere in the city. Of course getting wifi stations in sparsely populated areas isn’t exactly practical, but for denser regions, a home phone that works in the city might be plenty for most people. Interesting idea.

The other option is that Shaw might choose to buy out one of the new wireless companies, or perhaps even merge. With the lines between mobile and home broadband becoming blurred, it may make sense for a wireless-only and wired-only company to merge in order to more effectively compete with the big three.

One thing is for sure, Shaw’s home broadband plans are second to none in Canada right now, so a buyout of Shaw by Rogers would be a terrible thing for consumers.

Apple’s WWDC 2011 is going on right now and iOS5 is being announced and demoed. One feature in particular that I am interested in is iMessage.

iMessage looks to be Apple’s version of BlackBerry Messenger. It will do standard text messages, but also adds the ability to message any iOS device – iPods and iPads included. Now, if I can send a message from one wifi iPod to another wifi iPod, it can’t be using a telecom’s text message protocol. I wonder if the same is true for iPhone-iPhone messages.

If this is indeed true, it looks like text message revenue is about to go through the floor. Why pay for all those extra text messages when you can get them free with iMessage?

The second interesting bit is that now apps like WhatsApp have to tout their cross-platform nature. WhatsApp is a $0.99 app that is available on multiple platforms and allows sending text-like messages between users of WhatsApp. The messages are of course free, which means it can be a useful app if you send a lot of messages and have friends on the service. Because one of the biggest value propositions of WhatsApp is free messaging, it could be in some trouble now that iMessage seems to be setting itself up for free iOS-iOS messaging.

Rumours abound that the new iPhone 5 (or 4S, depending on who you listen to) will have a unified baseband which will work on Sprint and T-Mobile’s networks in the US.

I try to stay away from regurgitating rumours, but this has interesting implications for Canada. Sprint runs a WiMax 4G network which has very little implication for Canadian carriers, but the fact that the new iPhone may be able to run on T-Mobile’s “4G” (I say that because it is in fact HSPA+ and not true 4G/LTE) network could mean big things for Canadians.

T-Mobile runs on the same AWS band that new entrants Wind Mobile and Mobilicity run on – whatever phones work with T-Mobile’s high-speed network should also work with Wind and Mobilicity. The new entrants haven’t had much trouble growing their subscriber base, but there are still potential customers waiting in the wings because they want the iPhone.

One only needs to look south of the border to see how big a boost an AWS iPhone will be for Wind and Mobilicity. When the CDMA iPhone 4 finally came to Verizon, it was the most successful phone launch in Verizon history.

It has now been posted pretty much everywhere around the internet: Microsoft is about to buy Skype for $8.5 billion. This is purely a mobile move in my opinion.

Microsoft is behind the times with its smartphone operating system. Windows Mobile fell behind BlackBerry and Symbian, and all were taken by storm when the iPhone and Android hit the market. BlackBerry is still holding on and may come back with a resurgence, Symbian finally looks like it is going away, and Microsoft sent a strong signal that it wants to remain relevant with Windows Phone 7. While this OS is reportedly a fine smartphone platform, it is late out of the gate.

What do you do when you are late to the game? You buy someone to get in, and make some noise. This is where Skype comes in.

Skype is the best known service for making phone calls through your computer, and is probably the best known service for making VOIP calls from your smartphone. You can associate a phone number with your Skype account (Skype-In), and can use Skype to call regular phone numbers (Skype-Out). You can talk to someone from your smartphone to their smartphone for free if you are both Skype users, and can even video chat if you have a capable device. What’s more, it is cross platform – you can video chat from an iPhone to an Android phone. This makes switching phones and platforms easy as you are not tied into any one particular system on one particular phone.

By integrating Skype directly into a future release of Windows Phone (8?), Microsoft will provide customers with a very compelling value proposition. Windows Phone to Windows Phone calls can be free. All calls can go over VOIP/data and not require standard voice minutes. All your calls can be made over wifi, reducing your data needs. Your computer can become your phone.

Windows Phone 8 – $30/month with 6 GB data and unlimited calling in Canada/US?

With AT&T planning on using T-Mobile’s AWS network to build out an LTE network, North America will have a 130+ million subscriber mobile operator with an next-generation network operating on the 1700 MHz AWS band.

This is potentially great news for Wind and Mobilicity.

Most previous talk about LTE/4G has centered around the 700 MHz band in the upcoming spectrum auctions both in Canada and the US. This spectrum is highly coveted because it penetrates buildings well. Currently, no network operators own this spectrum so the bidding process is expected to be highly competitive.

In Canada, the limited resources of the new entrants means that they would have to rely on the CRTC to block off a certain amount of spectrum for them, or else Bell, Rogers, and Telus would simply buy it all up. Even still, the allocated amount would likely not be great, and would still be quite costly for the new entrants. With their future networks on the line, this would be a significant investment which they would eventually have to recoup from their customers.

The new entrants can not afford to miss out on the prime spectrum, not because it is inherently good, but because of the devices that will be built for it. With all the large US telecoms going for 700 MHz LTE spectrum, this is where the iPhone (6,7,8?), the iPad (3,4,5?), the new BlackBerrys, and the best Android devices will operate. None of these companies is going to make a special version of their devices for a Canadian telecom with 300,000 subscribers.

However, the decision by AT&T to use the AWS spectrum to build out LTE in the US will make all the big device manufacturers plan for AWS capable devices. Wind and Mobilicity just got a big helping hand from AT&T. Furthermore, with AT&T being a GSM network, it opens up the possibility of bringing AT&T devices north with a SIM to operate on AWS networks here.

Then there’s the possibility of better roaming agreements for Wind and Mobilicity in the US.

It will be interesting to see what Bell, Rogers, and Telus do with their LTE plans. They currently each have some AWS spectrum sitting unused as well. Will Canada’s LTE use 700 MHz and 1700 MHz, or will we have an annoying split still?

The AT&T conference call this morning shed some light on what will become of the AT&T – T-Mobile merger.

While fuller details can be had by reading the [pdf] on the AT&T investor relations site, the plans for the T-Mobile network are essentially to convert current T-Mobile users over to AT&T’s 3G network frequencies, using T-Mobile’s cell cites to add capacity to the stressed AT&T network, followed by transitioning T-Mobile’s 1700 MHz AWS spectrum over to future LTE use.

This looks like a great way for AT&T to rapidly add capacity while simultaneously adding spectrum for LTE deployment.

With Verizon already rolling out 4G service, and with Sprint already operating a WiMax network, AT&T will undoubtedly push for some LTE AWS phones ASAP.

It’s actually from when AT&T and Cingular merged, but is even more apropos today:

Businesswire press release:

DALLAS & BONN, Germany–(BUSINESS WIRE)–AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T) and Deutsche Telekom AG (FWB: DTE) today announced that they have entered into a definitive agreement under which AT&T will acquire T-Mobile USA from Deutsche Telekom in a cash-and-stock transaction currently valued at approximately $39 billion. The agreement has been approved by the Boards of Directors of both companies.

This move will make AT&T the largest US telecom by a substantial margin and could have interesting repercussions for devices around the world.

T-Mobile USA is a relatively new company and as a result, their 3G network is on the new 3G-AWS band. This band offers speeds similar to standard 3G, but requires a 3G-AWS chipset in the mobile device in order to work at those speeds. Essentially, this means that all the popular 3G devices (iPhones, most android phones etc) won’t work well on T-Mobile’s network. Many new telecoms around the world, including Wind and Mobilicity in Canada, also operate a 3G-AWS network and thus have a very limited selection of phones to offer their customers.

Hardware manufacturers are not willing to make AWS-compatible versions of all of their devices, so the new telecoms are generally left out. As some consumers make the handset their primary focus when choosing a phone plan, this eliminates a lot of customers for the new telecom companies.

This merger will mean that AT&T will absorb T-Mobile’s 34 million subscribers and 3G-AWS network. Adding this to AT&T’s 96 million subscribers turns AT&T into a company with 130 million subscribers and a 3G-AWS capable network.

This could mean one of two things:

1. Any hope for AWS-capable premium handsets (iPhone) is essentially dead.
2. AWS-capable premium handsets just became a lot more viable.

Which way it goes depends entirely on AT&T’s strategy going forward. On the one hand, manufacturers could see it as the death of a 34 million subscriber AWS company and see little need at all any more to produce AWS versions of phones. This would make the fight to get good devices just that much harder for Wind and Mobilicity.

On the other hand, AT&T could be fully integrating the AWS network into their own, in order to help boost their network in weak spots. They may encourage the use of the AWS network and this would entice hardware manufacturers to make an AWS version of all of their phones.

It is an interesting question I would like to see answered.

This is quite big news. Tony Lacavera, Chariman of Globalive, the company which owns the Wind Mobile brand, announced today on windmobile.ca that Wind Telecom will be bought by Russian telecom company VimpelCom for $6 billion.

Lacavera had this to say:

“Earlier today, the shareholders of Russian mobile telephone operator VimpelCom voted in support of a $6 billion deal to acquire WIND Telecom, whose assets include Orascom Telecom, a significant shareholder in WIND Mobile. The parties are now moving to close the deal, likely sometime in the first half of 2011.

This transaction would create the world’s fifth largest mobile operator by subscribers – more than 173 million subscribers!

This is great news for us. Our partner, Orascom, will be even larger and stronger as a financial partner. This gives us more leverage and increased scale with telecom network equipment manufacturers and more importantly, for devices including handsets and tablets. This will also give us more access to international cooperation for roaming and long distance services. All of that means the ability to deliver even more value to all of our customers.

I will keep you posted as new details emerge.”

Interesting development for sure. This could mean better international rates for Wind subscribers, as well as more capital for buying spectrum in the upcoming auctions, and sway with hardware providers for cheaper network equipment and access to handsets.

The structure of the deal should be interesting, considering that Wind has had trouble dealing with Canada’s foreign ownership rules regarding telecom companies in the past. Expect the CRTC and the current telecom companies to look into this.