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Rogers: We Don’t Expect an Industry Canada Decision on Shaw Spectrum Until September 2014

Rogers Communications held its quarterly results call yesterday, leading to a question on its expectation with regard to an Industry Canada decision on its proposed acquisition of spectrum from Shaw. Industry Minister Christian Paradis has signalled his concern with the proposal. Perhaps hoping for a delay in the decision, Rogers indicated that it does not expect Industry Canada to decide until roughly September 2014 (or well after the spectrum auction later this year). According to Ken Engelhart:

The 5-year limitation period for Shaw to sell the spectrum to an incumbent does not come up until September of 2014. So I don’t expect a decision from Industry Canada until September of 2014 or thereabouts. Obviously, it’s very useful spectrum for us to provide LTE services, so if we’re not allowed to buy it, we’ll need to figure something else there.

When asked in a follow-up whether there wouldn’t be some clarification of that prior to the spectrum auction, Engelhart responded that he did not expect that to happen.

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