The merger must not be allowed to proceed. Angus Reid polling suggests clearly that eight in 10 Canadians and, in fact, nine in 10 existing Rogers and Shaw customers oppose this merger because it obviously will create less choice and higher prices for Canadians.
Public interest advocates, academics and all sorts of parties oppose this merger. The Conservative Party, the NDP and a number of Liberal caucus members worry that consumers will be directly affected in Ontario, B.C. and Alberta.
The competition commissioner opposes this merger and did so under an act that we all recognize is deficient and is currently being overhauled by this government.
We recommend and we're calling on the minister to step in and block this anti-competitive merger.
Very importantly, there is nothing anti-Videotron about blocking this anti-competitive merger. Once the government saves Canadians from this anti-competitive merger, a fair, open and transparent process can be run for the Freedom Mobile assets.
To the extent that the Shaw family would like to sell them, the government can oversee a process to ensure that they go to a party that is qualified and that will ensure more competition for Canadians.
Again, there's nothing anti-Videotron about blocking this anti-competitive merger; it's just that the only mechanism left after the failure under the old Competition Act is for the minister to step in and decline a wireless licence transfer to Videotron.
Just by way of context and background, we at Globalive have been competing in the Canadian telecom industry for 25 years. We started competing in long-distance services back in the day. We competed in home phone and Internet service and brought prices down in those three categories. Then we founded, built and operated a facilities-based, independent, pure-play wireless carrier called Wind Mobile, and we successfully brought prices down 20%. That meant average household savings of $400 a year, whether you were a Wind Mobile customer or not. We're very proud of what we have achieved for Canadians in the past 25 years in reducing prices.
When we were in the process of continuing to build Wind from zero to almost $500 million a year in revenue, from zero to a million subscribers, from zero and start-up losses to positive $70 million of EBITDA when Shaw acquired the company, we were really committed to the long term and to continuing to build the business.
Unfortunately, in 2015 our governance was such that when Shaw approached the company with an attractive price, we were dragged into a sale to Shaw. We very publicly opposed that sale to Shaw, because our independent pure-play business model was proven and Canadians were voting with their feet. The growth of the business was spectacular, and we'd crossed strongly into positive EBITDA. We were dragged into that sale and, as I said, we opposed it.
To my mind, Wind Mobile was unfinished business. My goal has always been to provide lower prices, better service and more choices to Canadians, in all provinces and territories.
It is very much unfinished business for us. When Rogers announced the proposed acquisition of Shaw, we immediately contacted them and expressed our interest in re-entering the Canadian wireless market. Rogers told us they were not going to be selling any assets—and they were definitive about it—and that, regardless, we would not be entertained in any event.
After a year of pressing Rogers, we finally submitted a funded, all cash, no financing condition offer for $3.75 billion for the Freedom Mobile business. We were looking to re-enter and, again, finish the work and the business we had started.
Rogers did not entertain our offer for the obvious reason that we are an actual competitor. We actually had a track record of bringing prices down. They were permitted—and are being permitted, potentially, with this merger—to select who their new competitor is going to be. In no universe does it make sense for a company like Rogers to be able to select who their competitor is going to be and then prop them up with a series of commercial agreements that we see now may actually be in violation of the Telecommunications Act.
We call on the minister to block this anti-competitive merger. There is nothing anti-Videotron about blocking this anti-competitive merger and saving Canadians from it.
Once the minister steps in and does that, to the extent that the Shaw family wants to sell, the minister—the government—can oversee a fair, open and transparent process that ensures the best outcome for Canadians, and ensure that the acquirer of Freedom is committed to continuing to invest in networks, to buying more spectrum, to building into rural and indigenous communities, to creating more jobs, to bringing prices down for Canadians, and to bringing more innovation to the market, just as we did with Wind Mobile.
Wireless networks are as important as roads in the digital economy, and as such wireless networks need to be affordable, available and accessible to all Canadians.
Thank you. I look forward to your questions.