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Public Mobile appeals recent WIND Mobile ruling, heads to the Supreme Court of Canada
WIND Mobile has been battling it out in the courts for a few years now, all circling around the amount of foreign ownership they have and if they are truly a Canadian company. Industry Canada believes they are, then in June the Federal Court of Appeal ruled in favour of the new entrant and said they can continue to operate their business in Canada. This was supposed to put an end to the issue.
Now months later a TELUS spokesperson has said “We believe it’s time to let the market work”. Things seem to be progressing for WIND as they’ve rolled out to 6 locations and have over 300,000 subscribers. However, the other party who brought on the case was Public Mobile. When the Federal Court of Appeal made their decision Public sent out a press release that stated they were “heading to the Supreme Court of Canada. The company plans to continue its pursuit for a level-playing field on the issue of foreign ownership and control of wireless carriers in Canada”.
Public Mobile operates in both Toronto and Montreal and invested $53 million during the 2008 wireless spectrum auction. Public has a $350 million financing deal with ZTE Corporation and the Export-Import Bank of China, plus backed by with a $50 million investment from OMERS.
Last week, Public went forth and filed an appeal motion with the Supreme Court of Canada asking the case to be re-opened, which means that WIND could once again be heading back to court. John Pazzano, Director of legal affairs for Public stated that “The main rationale is that Public Mobile is seeking clarity”.
Source: FP
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37 comments for “Public Mobile appeals recent WIND Mobile ruling, heads to the Supreme Court of Canada”
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Public who? Oh yes the DOA cell carrier.
Export-Import Bank of China nothing sounds more Canadian then that.
At the end of the day the government needs to change the rules on foreign ownership.
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Public Mobile, just give up already! jeez!
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Who’s paying their legal fees Telus or China?
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Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
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get your facts straight before claiming this….LTE will be on 700 and AWS, PM’s current spectrum will stay for CDMA, since noone will manufacture phones for it, the same problem Wind and Mobi have with HSPA+…you are correct that its easier to upgrade a 1.25Mhz system to LTE than HSPA’s 5Mhz blocks (since there’s more useable spectrum at the start) PM is clearly not going to be deploying LTE for some time….
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It’s truly unbelievable that Public Mobile (a carrier that offers nothing to consumers really) is still fighting this. Spend money on your network and device selection and less money on legal counsel.
Your lawyers suck at their jobs, and you’re really just wasting time and money.
Supreme court of Canada will tell you the same thing. Much like escalating at one of the “Big 3″.
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PM is becoming Canada’s own SCO, what killed sco wasn’t the market, it was their never ending linux and ibm lawsuits. PM’s ceo has no hide that their long term plan is to make a buck selling the business away, their plan might end really badly just as sco… Investors: pay attention!
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Could you imagine if PM was a patent holding comany? We’d be calling them patent trolls (in my opinion)
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Don’t you guys understand that Public Mobile is primarily doing this so they can get an authorization from court to go seek more foreign funds and expand? Pissing off Wind/Mobilicity and other is only a secondary goal.
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Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
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I highly doubt this will lead to anything. The ruling at the Appeals Court level was not only unanimous but explicitly and specifically worded. The Supreme Court has never re-heard such decisive lower court decisions. Telus was supposedly happy with the current verdict but I bet there’s a money trail somewhere. If Telus is truly out of the running then this could potentially cost PM millions, and for what? They claim they need clarification of the rules, I don’t think they need to look any further than the Appeals Court ruling. Can’t get much clearer than that.
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Waste of tax payers dollars. Doesn’t the Supreme Court of Canada have better cases to deal with? This is a joke. Public Mobile should concentrate on building out there network. There is nothing stopping them from getting more foreign investment. No one is going to sue them if they try.
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“Public has a $350 million financing deal with ZTE Corporation and the Export-Import Bank of China, plus backed by with a $50 million investment from OMERS.”
This equals 80% financing from outside Canada. Who is controlling whom here.
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Makes you wonder if PM is just being a pawn used by a bigger group coughTELUScough.
Don’t want to get your hands dirty. So use someone no one cares about.
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Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
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I’ll do my “effing research” if you do:
FACT: Wind tested their LTE transmitters as late as December of last year. They’ve been building LTE ready towers since day 1. Read before you post!
FACT: With the expansion back on Wind may well not hit their goal but that’s primarily due to PM meddling (in collusion with Telus) and forcing Wind to suspend expansion. KW, Guelph and Cambridge are now online, Niagara’s coming later this year, followed by the London/Windsor corridor, Barrie and Peterborough. Not to mention further expansion in Vancouver, etc. Again, read before you post.
FACT: ROI is a funny thing. Just because someone invested $50M that doesn’t mean to say they’re making a better ROI than someone who invested $500M. PM’s plans are cheaper and making less proift as a %age than Wind or Mobi. Cheaper phones means cheaper mark ups too, ergo lower profits. Less investment doesn’t mean more profit. In fact, it mostly means the opposite.
NOT A FACT: How come you’re so special that you get access to PM’s sub rates? Just because you work in a store doesn’t mean you’re entitled to know anything. And what’s this about sub numbers on a contract? Why on earth would they be on a contract? And if PM’s keeping their sub numbers so tightly held then how come you’re leaking them? Everyone and their brother is peging PM in the low 100k’s, why do you have access to this privileged and hallowed info? Time to put up or shut up. Prove the sub numbers. And could you make up your mind what they are? A couple of weeks ago you we’re quoting about 225K (on a different type of internal document, BTW) and now it’s 250K?).
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what Public Mobile store do you work at phone guy?
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@phoneguy, can you provide us evidence to where it shows that PM has over 255,000 subs?
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Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
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Talk about beating a dead horse. You think they would find better things to do with their money, like improving their services an catching up with WIND and Mobilicity.
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Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
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Phoneguy, scan it and upload it to photobucket and put the link on here.
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Hey public, stop BAWWing.
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FACT pm blows. Wind may not have hit their subscriber target but they have been successful in changing the game when it comes to wireless in Canada. Most of the people on this site would not even consider PM as viable option when looking for a cell phone carrier. The people who do look at PM are most likely to purchase a cell phone at a gas station, 7-11 or Loblaws. Due to Wind’s entry into the market, companies are least somewhat trying (I use that term loosely) to make their customers happy and create less of a dent in their customer’s wallet. Public wants to be beneficial? Then start offering their clients what they are entitled to have which is why we needed new wireless companies to begin with. No 150 percent markup on phones, useless charges to customers. You are making money from your customer, stop trying to get profits in the tens of thousands percentile. Simple as that
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FACT – All statements with ‘FACT’ in front of it are unsubstantiated opinions including this one.
=P
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then prove me wrong grover. PM hasn’t really done anything for the Canadian wireless industry that wind didn’t set the trend for.
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@ yaknowit…ok 1st off the ppl on this site wouldnt consider PM to be a viable option thats bc the majority of ppl on this site are a bunch of wind/mobi fans and theres like 10 ppl that always only comment on everything I work at a cell phone store and not one customer I have asked has actually even heard of mobilesyrup I can care less what u f**s think of PM fact remains they are the only new entrant actually making money…2nd PM has over 200 locations in t GTA alone you can go to any store and buy a phone..3rd PM doesnt mark up there phones another fun fact is PM dealers pay $75 for the new buzz phone and right now its selling for $70 how is that a 150% markup?….PM has no hidden fees what so ever so Im not sure what your referring too there…PM offers the lowest unlimited plan in canada and you want cheaper? haha
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Grover, the only reason I used capitalised letters for “FACT” is because this is what phoneguy does when he’s throwing a tantrum. He also seems to use it when he either knows he has no clue what he’s talking about or is lying out of his arse (see also his newest & latest classic “read before you post”).
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The slogan in the picture sounds stupid.
“So simple, you can be talking today.”????
Does that imply I couldn’t talk yesterday?
Or Rogers/Wind/Bell doesn’t let you talk right after you activate your phone?
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Public is probably wasting time and money pursuing this in the courts, but what is wrong with getting clarity on foreign-ownership rules. If there are clear rules where one will not be slapped with fines or worse due to unclear ownership laws, then I can see why PM would want to pursue this. I could see why this is a competitive disadvantage and construe this as favouritism (from government) if a company like wind can get away with it but others would take a chance.
BTW, a credit facility (like the one from the Chinese Bank) is quite different from an investment from a VC. One is debt with fixed interest, the other a purchase for a share of ownership in the company with the expectation greater profit when that share is sold later. Very big difference.
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Public mobile is trying to stifle competition. Even Telus knows this. I would not get a phone from public mobile, even if they were the only game in town.
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Ok maybe, but how is it
a.) everyone knows this
b.) that asking for clarity on the rules of ownership stifling competition? If anything the government is stifling competition by introducing uncertainty in the industry.
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Way to go Public China! go @#$%!
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I always get a good laugh out of you “Public sucks, nobody users them,” people. If you and your friends are smartphone users, of course you wouldn’t use a company that only sells feature phones.
There are a LOT of people out there, though, who don’t care about data transmission speeds, screen ppi, or OS ecosystems. There are people out there who don’t even know how to text!
You don’t get into this industry without knowing what you’re doing. A lot of the best talent at Public came from the big 3, so believe me when I say they do things for a reason.
Also, they’ll be getting a lot more competitive some time soon…
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Public Mobile’s biggest mistake: assuming people are stupid.
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No greedy, they aren’t competitive at all 3 years and what have they done? They’re useless and dead weight just trying to get rid of some competition. Phoneguy is a PM fanboy probably because he four.d out he bought a CDMA phone which is completely useless in Canada now. They have a horrible network and horrible business motto. Can’t wait for those i****s to go bankrupt
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“A lot of the best talent at Public came from the big 3, so believe me when I say they do things for a reason.”
You’re right! Lots of retarts from the big 3 went to work for them, that why they got to where they are today. Go Public China!
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