CMR 2018 - Retail Fixed Internet Sector and Broadband Availability

The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (hereafter, the Commission) annually collects financial and subscription information on Internet services. In addition, information on the availability of broadband Internet services is collected in partnership with Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED). Also, the Commission conducts research into the data requirements of certain Internet-based audio and video applications. This report presents financial and subscription information over 5 year period from 2013 to 2017. This data is mostly broken into three groups: Incumbent TSPs. Examples of incumbent TSPs include Bell, SaskTel and TELUS. They also include small incumbent TSPs such as Sogetel and Execulink. Cable-based carriers. Examples of cable-based carriers include Rogers, Shaw, and Videotron. Other service providers. The “ Other service providers” category may be further divided into “ other carriers,” such as Xplornet and Allstream Business, and “ resellers,” such as Distributel and TekSavvy. This may also be referred to as resellers, utility telcos and other carriers. Utility telcos are providers of telecommunications services whose market entry, or whose corporate group’ s market entry, into telecommunications services was preceded by a group-member company’ s operations in the electricity, gas, or other utility business.

Broadband service availability is calculated using information provided by ISPs. For 2013 to 2015, locations were considered to be serviced if their dissemination block representative point fell within an area of broadband service coverage. As of 2016, ISED pseudohouseholds are used, along with 2016 census demography. Broadband service availability data may not take into account capacity issues or issues regarding line of sight. The information in this section does not take into account upload speeds unless noted.

Pseudohouseholds are points representing the population in an area. These points are placed along roadways within each area, and the population of the area, determined by Statistics Canada, is distributed among these points. Additional data regarding addresses and the position of dwellings is used to guide this distribution. The use of pseudohouseholds aims to improve the accuracy of the availability indicators over the use of the assumption that the population within an area is located at the centre of the area.

Unless otherwise noted, broadband service availability figures exclude wireless mobile technology and satellite. “ Satellite access services” in this section refer to direct-to-home (DTH) satellite, and not to the technology used to connect communities to the Internet (e.g. satellite link transport).

With regard to the Commission’ s research into data requirements, the CRTC used a test environment that aims to replicate how a typical consumer would utilize online streaming and real-time communications services. The services were accessed by a typical wireline residential broadband service, and a national LTE cellular data network, using mainstream off-the-shelf consumer electronics: Android- and iOS-based tablets and phones, smart TVs, Windows-based laptop and desktop computers, and various set-top streaming devices. A web browser was used to access the streaming services on the PCs, and official applications (apps) were used on the other devices.