[Canada]
Mike --
Looking at the two markets Amati's targetted at the outset --- Hong Kong and Canada -- I have to say Alexander the Great had nothing on these guys. Somebody on their board must be Macedonian.
Even though Europe and the U.S. are limping along behind, here at home who's in the lead???? Yep, GTE.
While nosing through the different Canadian web sites, I saved bits and pieces and will go ahead and post even though there's no order and no comment --- just a string of notes.
Enjoy!
Pat
Stentor R&D:
stentor.ca
BC TEL
MovieRoute service permits instant digital transmission of video footage between B.C. and California film studios, using new video compression technology and a 45-megabit-per-second fibre optic pipeline for outstanding transmission quality and speed.
Canada's first large public Internet network access point(NAP) will make Vancouver one of North America's key Internet traffic exchange hubs.
Ubiquity - BC TEL was the first company in North America to deploy a commercial ultra-high speed ATM switching network, known as Ubiquity. This network is widely regarded as among the most advanced in the world, facilitating flexibility and innovation.
BC TEL
High-speed digital network connecting B.C.'s three largest universities. This lightning-fast 155-megabit-per-second pipeline will allow the University of British Columbia, the University of Victoria and Simon Fraser University to transmit research findings, conduct desktop video conferences or offer interactive live distance education. The testbed will use the latest digital and ATM technology to develop applications for use in other educational and research environments.
BCTEL stats:
Highlights of BC TELECOM's Capital Investment Plan for 1997:
The installation of 37 new digital switches in communities such as Quesnel, Hudson's Hope, Port Hardy and Ashcroft. . .
The upgrading of party-line customers to single-line service in 43 communities including Tatla Lake, Invermere, Nelson and Masset. . . .
The extension of telephone service to many remote communities using a variety of technologies, and the introduction of cellular service in others. The extension of a fibre-optic route from Terrace to Prince Rupert. This will provide customers access to high-speed Internet and Ubiquity(TM) videoconferencing services. The completion of a fibre-optic loop from Prince George, through Jackman near the Alberta border, to Kelowna. This will provide a second route for B.C. traffic. The introduction of digital PCS (personal communications services) network in March. This provides wireless customers with improved call clarity, longer battery life, increased security and no interference.
The continued expansion of high-speed Internet services which provide customers fast access to the World Wide Web and corporate computer networks, as well as video conferencing capabilities.
The introduction of a new high-bandwidth service using technology that allows copper telephone lines to carry data, graphics and video images at lightning fast speeds.
The launch of Western Canada's first network access point (NAP) in March. This Internet exchange centre ensures that Internet traffic originating and terminating in British Columbia stays in the province, and that traffic bound for elsewhere in Canada remains in the country.
The completion of a broadband, fibre optic backbone network using asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) to eight major regional centres identified by the provincial government. These communities are Vancouver, Victoria, Kamloops, Kelowna, Prince George, Terrace, Nelson and Nanaimo. This gives the provincial government increased data transfer capacity at much faster speeds than its current network allows.
Fast facts about BC TEL's telecommunications network
Currently, more than 97 per cent of British Columbians have individual-line service and are connected to a digital switch. This provides access to faxing, the Internet, e-mail, data transfer, call management and many other features. By the end of 1997, 99 per cent of British Columbians will be served by digital switches. By the end of 1999, 100 per cent of customers will have access to individual-line service and will be served by digital switches. There are more than 2.4 million access lines in British Columbia.
BC
With the launch of MediaLinx h@abitat, a $ 500,000 advanced multimedia training and experimentation facility, the Canadian Film Centre has stepped into cyberspace. Funded by Bell Canada, Film Centre founder Norman Jewison, and MediaLinx CEO and Bell Group Vice President John Sheridan, this partnership will ensure the convergence of the film, television and multimedia communities to create a new breed of digital producers.
stentor.ca
Building the Networks of Tomorrow
Even before the Beacon Initiative was announced, the Stentor companies were involved in the Canadian Network for Advancement of Research and Education (CANARIE). CANARIE is a non-profit corporation made up of organizations representing universities, government, and industry and was created to assist in the research and development of high-speed information highway communications for a variety of users.
Now CANARIE operates the largest and most complex Asynchronous Transfer Mode network in the world, a network that can simultaneously handle voice, video and data broadcasts. The Stentor owner companies helped build and operate it. CANARIE runs over the Stentor owner companies' extensive network.
The test-bed network allows its partners, including the phone companies, to push the limits to find unique solutions to the world of advanced broadband networking, crucial to build the information highway Canadians need. Through membership in CANARIE, the Stentor companies are testing the technologies to make the information highway and its benefits a reality for Canadians.
CANARIE
stentor.ca
Canada is an excellent place to do business. Banking, communications and transportation services are among the best in the world. Investor confidence is high: gross inflows of foreign direct investment have more than doubled in recent years. Consumer confidence is the highest it's been in 5 years. Under the North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), companies with operations in Canada have preferred access to a market of 360 million consumers with a combined Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of $8.5 billion.
But more than just these facts, Canada offers a huge advantage in having one of the most advanced, extensive and universally accessible communications infrastructures in the world. The Canadian information highway is now a work in progress. The private sector is deploying and interconnecting advanced networks as well as developing innovative products and services. Businesses, institutions and consumers are offered greater choice and lower prices than in other developed countries. Canada's federal government is a key player through legislation, policy and regulation governing communications systems and Research and Development, and is a major user of information products and services.
The information highway allows disparate industries, sectors, groups and individuals to link and interact with each other in new ways, to create new products and services, to search out markets and trade globally, and to organize solutions that will meet an endless variety of needs.
The widespread use of communications and information technologies has already transformed banking and financial services as well as the travel and retail sectors through applications such as on-line banking, electronic data interchange, electronic funds transfer and computerized reservation systems. Automated teller machines, point-of-sale systems, and credit and debit cards have changed the way consumers bank, shop and make payments.
Building on existing and planned communications networks, this infrastructure will become a "network of networks," linking Canadian homes, businesses, governments and institutions to a wide range of interactive services from entertainment, education, cultural products and social services to data banks, computers, electronic commerce, banking and business services.
Telecommunications: a competitive advantage
Canada's vast distances have resulted in many firsts in telecommunications deployment: public packet switching in the 1970s, optical fibre in the 1980s and an intercontinental Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) network from Vancouver to Berlin in the 1990s. Canadian telecommunications companies have a domestic market with extensive requirements for state-of-the-art technology. . . .
Public Networks
The public telecommunications system is by far the largest part of Canada's existing communications infrastructure. It consists of over 250 million kilometres of public switched telephone and data networks as well as satellite, cellular telephone and mobile radio networks, all of which are interconnected. Although telephone networks are constructed and managed on a regional or national basis, interconnection and revenue-sharing arrangements have in effect created a global network, which permits any telephone in Canada to call any other telephone in the world.
Today, almost 16 million access lines connect more than 98 per cent of Canadian households, as well as virtually all business and institutional users, to basic telephone service. This is a monumental accomplishment, given Canada's size and population distribution.
Private Networks
Canada also has a large number of private networks serving business, government, research, education and community interests. Most of these lease private lines from telecommunications carriers, like Stentor alliance companies, to establish dedicated networks that provide services customized to the specific requirements of their users or at a lower cost than their public network equivalents.
Large organizations such as banks, insurance companies, utilities, airlines and governments have long used private networks for direct support of their operations, marketing or related activities. The federal Government Telecommunications and Informatics Services is the largest private network in Canada. The best-known example of an international computer communications network is the Internet, which interconnects some 10,000 networks and over 20 million users in the United States, Canada and 150 other countries.
. . . CANARIE, The Canadian Network for the Advancement of Resarch, Industry and Education, is one example of such an initiative. As a non-profit corporation established in 1993, its mission is to develop a communications infrastructure for a knowledge-based society in Canada.
The Importance of Broadband
Broadband telecommunications provides for in the 1990s what microcomputers provided for in the 1980s: a fundamental change in the way we live and do business. The 1980s saw desktop computers proliferate in our offices, factories and homes, putting processing power in the hands of people throughout the world. The first half of the 1990s saw those computers linked into powerful networks for data communications. The second half of the 1990s will see far more extensive communications, not just for data, but for still image, motion video and high quality audio, to complement the processing power we already have. The benefits of networked multimedia with its impact on industry, commerce, education and health care will be delivered by broadband telecommunications.
The key technological innovation driving this change has been the conversion of information, whether as sound, pictures, text or numbers, into streams of digitized "bits." Digitization means that information can be manipulated at high speed by computers. The exponential increase in computing power over the past 20 years, coupled with dramatic reductions in cost, have made computer applications essential to business and government, and much more affordable for use in homes and schools. At the same time, the development of inexpensive fibre optic cable, new wireless technologies, digital compression and switching techniques allows these digital bit-streams to be communicated at high speed over a wide variety of wireless and wireline networks. It is now possible to exchange information anywhere in any format and to conduct transactions electronically over any distance.
The Power of Telecommunications
Our sophisticated communications infrastructure will help ensure that all Canadian businesses are positioned to capitalize on the new possibilities inherent in the information age. The superiority of Canada's telecommunications network delivers a genuine competitive advantage in global business for individuals and companies establishing themselves here. What's more, experts predict that the new marketplace arising from the convergence of telecommunications technologies will be the core driver of the world economy by the end of the century, if not sooner. To remain competitive in the new world economy requires more than land, labour and capital. It requires the ability to communicate electronically with a variety of different methods, using a seamless high-speed network. The Stentor alliance offers both the vision and the critical mass to deliver the power of telecommunications to business in Canada that reaches around the world. >>>
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