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Wireless and Internet services were cut off for 12 million people on July 8, due to a network shutdown
Author of the article:
bloomberg news
Randy Thanthong-Knight
publication date:
25 July 2022 • 53 minutes ago • Read 1 minute • Join the conversation Rogers Communications Inc. President and Chief Executive Officer Tony Stafieri, left, and Rogers Communications Inc.’s Chief Technology and Information Officer Ron McKenzie testify during a Standing Committee on Technology and Industry hearing in Ottawa on Monday. Photo by David Kawai / Bloomberg
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The top executive at Rogers Communications Inc. said the company “failed to deliver” on the promise of reliable service and will spend at least $250 million to separate its wireless and wireline networks as a result.
Rogers Chief Executive Tony Stafieri was testifying before a Canadian parliamentary committee on July 8 about the collapse of the network, which shut down wireless and Internet services for 12 million people. The outage affected emergency services, financial payment systems, businesses and government offices.
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Industry minister François-Philippe Champagne says he should not have reached out to Rogers CEO Tony Stafieri during the massive national network outage. It should have been the other way round. #rogers outage #telecom #wireless
— Barbara Shechter (@BatPost) 25 July 2022
Staffieri told lawmakers that desegregating the network would help strengthen them further. Industry Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne has ordered Canadian telecommunications companies to design an advanced system so that if a provider encounters a major network problem, 911 calls and other critical services will still function.
The committee is seeking answers from officials at Rogers and the country’s telecommunications regulator, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, about the reasons for the failure to avoid such incidents, its implications and future plans.
“It was a failure of a company. It was a failure of Rogers,” Champagne told the committee on Monday.
The network crisis has put further pressure on Stafieri as Toronto-based Rogers seeks approval from Ottawa to take on rival Shaw Communications Inc. in a $20 billion deal. Rogers is facing a legal challenge from the Competition Bureau of the proposed acquisition.
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