Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne isn’t sharing any new information regarding his decision on the Rogers-Shaw merger.
At an Industry and Technology committee meeting Monday, he said he has “not made a decision yet.” He continued that he isn’t close to finalizing anything and that “there will be a decision in due course.”
The Minister is responsible for approving the transfer of Shaw’s wireless licenses to Vidéotron, which is crucial for Rogers’ takeover of Shaw to proceed.
The $26-billion transaction, along with Vidéotron’s plans to acquire Freedom Mobile, have already jumped through various hoops. It successfully fought the Competition Bureau’s push to block the merger and gained approval for broadcast aspects from the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC).
However, the CRTC is currently examining an application from TekSavvy arguing Rogers is giving Vidéotron “undue preference.” While this file can’t stop the mergers from proceeding, it has received widespread support, including comments from the Competitive Network Operators of Canada and OpenMedia.
Globalive also filed comments, which says the moves “are simply a result of Rogers’ efforts to clear a major regulatory hurdle to its proposed acquisition of Shaw.” The company also says the “undue preference” will hurt its efforts to re-enter the mobile market.
“Globalive is also concerned with the negative effect these preferential arrangements will have on the development of competition for the provision of wireless services in Canada and specifically, the negative effects these arrangements will have on Globalive’s re-entry into the wireless market in Canada,” the company said in its comments.
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