Industry Committee on June 4th, 2019

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thanks to everybody who has joined us on short notice and using technology.

It's good to see you again, John. We saw each other at the Pint of Science in Guelph a few weeks ago. Dan Gillis put on great events across Guelph where we learned about some of these new technologies.

The presentation that you gave that night, is that something you could send in to our clerk, so that we could include some of those details in our report?

[John Lyotier]

Yes, sure. I'd be happy to.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Terrific.

One of the main purposes of this study is looking at how we get cellphone coverage into rural areas.

It's an underlying purpose, I should say. How do we get cellphone coverage into areas experiencing floods, forest fires and disasters, where you need to communicate between teams of people to coordinate things like sandbags or water delivery?

When I saw what you've done in Rigolet, it seems that it's something that can be deployed quite quickly. Is that true, in terms of dropping in Android devices into an area and having them connect to each other?

[John Lyotier]

Yes, you could do something like that. I think when it comes to a disaster situation when the cellphone towers might be down, that's probably one of the best options. I still think that, in situations where you can use infrastructure, that's definitely going to be the best. This is a good alternative if there is no option like it.

For example, in California when the wildfires were spreading so fast that they were was taking down the cellphone towers faster than people could get the warning messages, that might be a situation where something like this might be useful.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Okay.

There are some technology limitations. You mentioned in the presentation in Guelph that some makes of phone don't communicate very well with others. They don't have very good access unless you have certain pass codes. Androids seem to be one of the main focus points for you.

[John Lyotier]

Yes.

IOS, for example, is very locked down when it comes to how you can control the connectivity between phones. You can make some small, limited meshes. I think they are making efforts to sort of lock this down so they can control the entire thing. But on Android it's more open, and you can have networks that self-form and self-heal much easier than on other devices.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

In terms of deployment, if we looked at hitting areas that, let's say, are experiencing some kind of climate change disasters, you could deploy into that area and then leave the infrastructure behind so that those communities would then have access. I'm thinking of communities around lakes.

We had a study on rural broadband a few years ago. Again, the University of Guelph was here talking about the SWIFT network in southern Ontario and the way density is calculated. Quite often there are dense populations around a lake, and then through the whole rest of the area there isn't any requirement for broadband. Then those areas don't get served properly.

It seems to me this could be something that could complement our broadband hard infrastructure into some areas where we have density pockets.

[John Lyotier]

I think that Rigolet really shows off that type of use case. There are 300 people there. If you look at the broader area, it's not a very dense place, but the town itself is so dense that you could actually cover it with a mesh of cellphones. We figure with 300 people, we could probably cover the whole town with about 50 phones. We did some tests just walking around with the phones that we brought with us, and with about 10 or so you could reach from one side of town to the other. Then it's just a matter of filling out the rest of the town with the phones.

You could use some actual hardware, some hardware off the shelf, and in addition to that you could make some longer links for the phones—maybe you don't reach as far. This type of strategy, I think, is really a low-cost and effective way you can combine that with maybe one fast Internet connection into town.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Finally from me, has Rigolet developed to a point where you could then scale it to other communities?

Could you take, let's say, the learning from Rigolet and apply it to other northern communities and then maybe some other communities, let's say, in southern Ontario that don't have access?

[John Lyotier]

That's pretty much our plan right now, and beyond even Ontario and Canada, we're looking at places in India and Bangladesh and parts of the developing world as well. The challenges are a bit different in some of those places. The density is not so much a problem in those places.

We have learned a lot in Rigolet. With a lot of the interest that we've been generating at some of the events we've been going to, there are definitely other communities interested.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Terrific. Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Dan Ruimy]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Albas, you have five minutes, sir.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to all the witnesses for taking the time out of your schedules to be with us and to share your expertise.

First, to the Agence interrégionale de développement des technologies de l’information et des communications, in a brief that you submitted to the finance committee in 2016 you were advocating prioritizing mobile wireless in your government's rural broadband funding programs. In a world with obviously limited money, do you still think focusing on mobile coverage is of higher priority than home broadband?

[The Chair, Liberal, Dan Ruimy]

Did you hear the question, Mr. Nepton?

[André Nepton]

Yes, absolutely.

When we call on elected officials in our municipalities, the priority is cell phones. Indeed, since the advent of LTE technology, both Internet access and telephony can be offered. It is clear that for the Internet, costs are a little higher, but telephony is the basis of security, especially on our access roads.

Elected officials are constantly asking us for more than affordable access to the Internet. However, various technologies, including the advent of satellite transmission, have so far made it possible to meet current standards. As a result, the priority remains bandwidth, despite urban sprawl and low population densities.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

I certainly agree that safety is a priority, but as my colleague Mr. Chong has said a number of times, it's not just a question of accessibility; it's accessibility to make sure there's safety, but also affordability. When I hear from people in rural areas, I hear concerns about mobile coverage as well as home broadband. However, when most people don't have access to affordable Internet in their homes, that seems to be a top priority. Mobile data is inherently more expensive than land-line data. Is this not a concern when prioritizing mobile data over fibre to the home?

[André Nepton]

The industry is in the process of adjusting its pricing, which you can see.

Indeed, the residential fixed wireless industry is constantly reducing its prices and increasing its performance. In my opinion, to meet the competition, the residential fixed wireless industry will adjust in the medium term.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

No, I can appreciate that argument, but again, for many people, if there's no capacity to pay what the going premium is, it can be very difficult. I do thank you for the answer, and I do hope that the price differential does resolve itself.

Moving over to Xplornet, how many of your rural customers are currently on a fixed wireless solution?

[Christine J. Prudham]

Almost 60% of our customers.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

I have been watching closely, but I still have not seen a decision from government on how much of the 3,500 megahertz spectrum they plan to claw back. According to your brief to ISED about this clawback, you indicated that it would negatively impact your business. Do you have any sense of how the government will proceed upon hearing that?

[Christine J. Prudham]

Upon hearing that it will negatively affect our business?

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Yes.

[Christine J. Prudham]

Well, they have certainly been concerned, obviously, about the potential impact of this. I think they have listened carefully to what we've had to say. We've been very transparent with them. We've mapped out all of our customers and indicated exactly the areas where there is potential for impact. When I say we've been trying to work towards a solution, we've certainly done everything we can to provide the information. At the end of the day, it will be up to the minister and the department.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

If the government went with option one, how many of your customers would lose service?

[Christine J. Prudham]

A significant percentage.