Pretty massive deal this morning that I figured should have a thread. It’s a $26bn purchase for Rogers and apparently has the blessing of the Shaw family trust.
This sounds like terrible news from a consumer standpoint. I have been a long time Shaw customer and overall my experience has been pretty good. I hate Rogers though and I have no interest in dealing with them.
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We already have so little variety in the telecom space, I can’t see this as a good thing.
Selfishly, because I’m on Shaw for TV/Internet and Rogers for cell, maybe I’ll get a bundling discount...
Nothing to be selfish about seeing it appears to be a reality so may as well hope for the best outcome. I'm in the same boat and hopefully there will be bundle discounts. On the bright side I would hope Rogers invests in bringing 4k TV services as Shaw was moving at a snail's pace upgrading their feeds. I personally don't like Shaw at all but I can't imagine the services will be considerably better under Rogers. What happens to all the @shaw.ca emails?
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too bad they don't care one bit about that. ####ers
"Shaw CEO Brad Shaw, who would join Rogers’ board along with another Shaw nominee, said in a statement the two companies can unlock “tremendous shareholder value” by combining"
Hopefully they are forced to sell the phone portion of the business as part of the merger. We don’t need to lose another phone provider. The Cable/internet side doesn’t really change anything.
Aww ####, any chance this will be held up by regulators?
I don't think this gets announced unless they're pretty sure they'll meet regulatory requirements. I think their announced investments into 5G and Rural Broadband starts to address that.
Their Cable territories don't really cross over, so I doubt that's an issue. I'm betting Shaw/Freedom's cell marketshare isn't overly huge, so I'm betting that can be resolved. And I wouldn't be surprised if there's a forced sale of some TV and radio stations by each other.
Not for four years from now based on the press release. Deal is one year from close, commitment from Rogers not to raise prices for 3 years after. How generous of them
Quote:
• The combined company is committed to continue offering affordable wireless plans, with no overage fees, that meet the budgets and needs of Canadians. As part of this commitment, Rogers will not increase wireless prices for Freedom Mobile customers for at least three years following the close of the transaction
I don't think this gets announced unless they're pretty sure they'll meet regulatory requirements. I think their announced investments into 5G and Rural Broadband starts to address that.
Their Cable territories don't really cross over, so I doubt that's an issue. I'm betting Shaw/Freedom's cell marketshare isn't overly huge, so I'm betting that can be resolved. And I wouldn't be surprised if there's a forced sale of some TV and radio stations by each other.
Freedom/Shaw has ~2M mobile subs vs. 10.8M from Rogers. There's also a lot of spectrum that Shaw purchased which will cause regulatory/licensing problems for Rogers as the CRTC license for that spectrum was specifically for new entrants. We'll see parts of Freedom or the spectrum licenses likely being sold off at the very least.
Rogers to buy Shaw
