There’s some real drama going on in Canada’s wireless industry right now. By now, many of you know that Verizon has been rumored to be eyeing one of the smaller carriers in Canada, which would be WIND Mobile. On Tuesday, the head of WIND Mobile, Tony Lacavera said that he was tired of the incumbents “misleading the public,” and wants the other side of the story to be told. There was a post made on the WIND Mobile’s blog, that the company’s CEO and its holder of voting shares calls the Big Three carriers an “oligopoly” and praises the Conservative governments commitment to ensuring a fourth player is present in every region in Canada.
“The whole campaign is a bit ridiculous” said Lacavera. “We were forced out of the CWTA,” which Lacavera was referring to the carrier’s withdrawal, along with Mobilicity and Public Mobile, from the carrier advocacy group earlier this year. “I ignored the incumbents’ advertising, but when the CWTA started up their own campaign I had to say something.”
Right now Canada is one of the most expensive wireless industry’s in the world. For those of you in the US, if you thought that Verizon and AT&T were expensive, go check out the prices in Canada. They are through the roof and will go even higher once the new 2-year term pricing goes into effect. Yes, they finally dropped those 3-year contracts.
Since I’m not actually in Canada, although I live very close to it, I can’t speak for what’s going on up there. But I do hope it gets better. With that said, you can check out the whole interview here with WIND Mobile’s head, Tony Lacavera. Between the GSM, CDMA, LTE, and LTE Max networks up in Canada, it’s pretty messy. While I always thought Verizon was crazy expensive, that’s nothing compared to what’s in Canada. I really feel sorry for Canadians. But I’ve talked to a few people on G00gle+ that are from Canada and they want to see Verizon make their way into Canada and give the Big Three some competition so we’ll see what happens.