SSi wants a wholesale deal though
IQALUIT – Northwestel and its parent Bell Canada announced Tuesday that 15 megabits per second (Mbps) Internet and LTE wireless service are now available in all 25 Nunavut communities. The announcement was made as business leaders, investors and government officials gathered for the 2019 Nunavut Trade Show and Conference in Iqaluit.
Northwestel and Bell are using the new open-access Tamarmik Nunaliit network to deliver the new services. Operating on Telesat ka-Band satellite technology, the network provides up to 20 times more Internet capacity than previously available, making high-speed Internet and wireless service possible in each community, according to the company release.
“Northwestel is thrilled to announce that our Tamarmik Nunaliit network is fully connected and delivering high-speed Internet across Nunavut,” said Paul Gillard, vice-president of business markets at Northwestel, in the release. “This achievement in network technology will help bolster the quality of life for Nunavummiut through increased connectivity for schools and health centres, and enhanced access for residents and businesses. It has also been made possible as a direct result of many partners working successfully together to achieve the shared goal of improving connectivity in every community.”
The two-year project was completed with support from a range of partners, including Industry Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED) through the Connect to Innovate program, and Bell Mobility.
Bell Mobility’s LTE wireless service is now available in all 25 Nunavut communities and at the same time, residents in Arviat, Cambridge Bay, Iqaluit and Rankin Inlet can now order 15 Mbps Internet service through Northwestel while those in all other Nunavut communities have access to fixed wireless Internet service through Bell.
Prices have dropped (but are still high compared to urban Canada) and both speeds and data have increased. Prior to the new network, the main offer from Northwestel was 5 Mbps and 55 GB usage for $399/month and now customers get 15 Mbps and 100 GB of data for $129/mo.
All that said, the day before, local news outlet Nunatsiaq News published a report decrying the fact the network wasn’t yet done and that local ISP SSi Micro has not been able to gain wholesale access to the new network. SSi has been offering broadband (through Qiniq) and wireless in the territory for some time.
“Discussions were initiated by us immediately,” when the new network build was announced, said Dean Proctor, chief development officer at SSi, in that news story. “About two years later, we are still not connected with them. But we continue to try.
“How important is open access? It’s absolutely essential, because competitors are already in the last-mile marketplace. What we need is proper access to backbone,” he told the paper.
A Northwestel spokesman told Cartt.ca any third party provider is welcome to access its network “at established rates.” (Update clarifier: Those rates have established as part of the open-access funding agreement with ISED, so they are not set solely by Northwestel.)
“ISED's Connect to Innovate Program provided Bell/NWTel with $49.9 Million in subsidies to build an open access satellite backbone to benefit all service providers,” Proctor told Cartt.ca in an email this week. “Given that we are operational in all 25 communities, and given the desperate need for more backbone capacity, at affordable rates, in Nunavut, we obviously have an interest in gaining access to the NWTel/Bell subsidized backbone. But we are still not connected to them.”
