Will Verizon Wireless in Canada Save me Money?

With the co-ordinated campaigns underway by Rogers, TELUS and Bell targeting the government wireless spectrum auction policy, you may think that substantial savings are in store for your organization if Verizon enters the Canadian market.   Well, in my opinion, any benefits, IF Verizon enters the market are years away for large organizations.

Why?

1.  It will take years to build a business focused capability. Large organizations need reliable and affordable national service offering.  As much as I like and use Wind for personal use, as a business service for a large organization it lacks the national reach and the quality to support national organizations.  Wind and Mobilicity are consumer focused today in large Canadian metropolitan areas.  They offer deep discount plans to these consumers.  While their service quality has improved, with roaming boundary issues and AWS spectrum in-building penetration issues, I doubt that many organizations would find it satisfactory to switch from a large incumbent provider to the current level of service offered.

2. 3G vs LTE – If Verizon acquires  Wind and Mobilicity, it may have enough spectrum to permit a build-out of an LTE network today, Verixon would likely wait to build ou ton the 700 MHz spectrum for an LTE network.  With an auction in 2014 it would be at least 2015 before a build would be completed given the need to build, secure site locations and roaming agreements with the Big 3 Incumbents.

3. Roaming Agreements – Bell, Rogers and TELUS have done a good job in making it difficult for Wind and Mobilicity to get attractive roaming rates.  I know, I was involved in negotiations regarding roaming and prepared submissions to Industry Canada.  The new wireless entrants are on the record saying that they get better roaming rates to the United States than they can get domestically.  The way the benchmark is currently set by Industry Canada, it will not be easy for Verizon to get great roaming rates to offer attractive national plans to Canadian organizations.

What should organizations do in the interim?

As in all telecom agreements, the key is to balance costs and contract prices, terms and flexibility.   There is healthy competition for a large organization’s wireless business today.   Think about using a telecom consultancy with expertise in needs assessment, benchmarking and negotiations to help you best meet your needs now and in the future.