February 4, 2010

Bell Canada Announces FTTH & IPTV Initiative

Bell today announced several new fibre initiatives supporting its broadband investment strategy, including the deployment of Fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) in Québec City and to new housing developments in Ontario and Québec, the launch of enhanced Bell Fibe(TM) Internet services, and the introduction of Bell IPTV service in 2010. "Investment in broadband networks and services is a core strategic imperative at Bell. We're actively building the communications platforms that support the growth of competitive new Internet, video and other digital services now and into the future," said George Cope, President and CEO of BCE and Bell Canada. "Bell is executing with significant investments in both wireless, with our November launch of Canada's largest and fastest mobile network, and in wireline with the new fibre-based network investments and services announced today."

Fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) investments
Bell today announced a three-year plan to deploy high speed Fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) across the Québec City region, including Ancienne-Lorette, Beauport, Charlesbourg, Lévis-Wolfe, Loretteville, St-Cyrille, Ste-Foy, St-Nicolas, St-Réal and St-Romuald. FTTH will offer consumer and business customers Internet download speeds of at least 100 Megabits per second and upload speeds of at least 20 Mbps. One of the first FTTH deployments in Canada, Bell's Québec initiative is also by far the largest city-wide FTTH rollout in the country. Because the Québec City region is served largely by "aerial" infrastructure -above-ground wiring on utility poles - these extensive fibre deployments can be accomplished much faster and more economically than in centres withunderground infrastructure.

Bell also announced today it will deploy FTTH in all new urban and suburban housing developments in Ontario and Québec beginning in the second half of 2010. This is in addition to the company's deployment of Fibre-to-the-building (FTTB) already under way, which will deliver 60 Mbps service to approximately 1,600 condominium and apartment buildings in Ontario and Québec by the end of 2012.

Bell Fibe(TM) Internet
Bell's new Fibe Internet service is now available in Montréal and the Greater Toronto Area, providing customers access to increased uploads speeds as high as 7 Megabits per second - the fastest available in the market - and download speeds now as fast as 25 Mbps. "Bell Fibe Internet is the fast, consistent and reliable way to access the Internet, and it's built for the way people use the Internet now," said Kevin Crull, President of Bell Residential Services. "With its increased speeds, especially on uploads, Fibe Internet supports the strong growth we're seeing in the sharing of videos, pictures and documents in line with the revolution in social networking and online communities."

Fibe Internet employs advanced tools to proactively monitor and optimize customer access speeds and offers comprehensive security features at no extra cost, including parental controls, pop-up blocker, privacy control, Wi-Fi protection, fraud protection and 5 Gigabytes of Personal Vault online storage. For more information, please visit bell.ca/internet. Fibe Internet is enabled by advanced VDSL2 technology enhancements to Bell's Fibre-to-the-node (FTTN) network in Toronto and Montréal. By next month, Bell will have passed 1.8 million homes with advanced VDSL2 capability, and approximately 3.6 million FTTN households in Québec and Ontario will be enhanced by the end of 2010.

Bell IPTV
Bell's advanced FTTN network also supports the addition of Bell IPTV to the Bell TV line-up in 2010. All-digital Bell IPTV (internet protocol television) will deliver a wide range of advanced television and entertainment services over Bell's fibre network to customers in Toronto and Montréal this year. "Bell IPTV is the perfect urban complement to our fast-growing Bell TV service, which already serves almost 2 million Canadians coast to coast and offers far more HD channels than any other provider in the country," said Kevin Crull. "Bell TV is already the digital TV leader across Canada, but Bell IPTV will soon significantly enhance competition and consumer choice in TV services in these core urban markets."

Already in extensive consumer trials, Bell IPTV is powered by the  Microsoft Mediaroom multimedia software platform, the most widely deployed IPTV platform in the world.

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