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Oct. 7, 2009

Two Canadian phone companies, Telus Corp. and Bell Canada say they will start offering two models of the Apple iPhone next month, a move that will put added pressure on rival Rogers Wireless.

Overall, it will be the first time Telus or Bell have ever offered Apple smartphones, which so far have only worked in Canada on the Rogers wireless network.

Some wireless industry observers say it will be interesting to see what will happen to Canadian prices for iPhones and related wireless services, now that Rogers has lost its exclusivity and there will be three-way competition among the long-time telcos.

In the U.S., AT&T is fighting as much as it can to have its exclusive contract renewed with Apple in time before its 2010 expiration deadline.

For many months it's been long anticipated that Canada's No. 2 and No. 3 wireless companies after Rogers would begin offering Apple smartphones once they rolled out their new wireless networks.

On Oct. 5, Bell announced that its new high-speed wireless network will be ready across Canada next month, about six weeks ahead of its original deadline it had set last April.

Telus and Bell said late yesterday in separate announcements that they will both start offering the iPhone 3G and the all new iPhone 3GS on Nov. 10.

Neither telco provided any information on pricing or any other specific details.

The announcements weren’t a surprise, said Liz Hamilton, a spokeswoman for Toronto-based Rogers. “In other markets outside of the U.S., Apple is offering consumers an option of multiple wireless carriers,” she said.

Overall, global sales of smartphones rose about 27.1 percent in the second quarter, according Gartner Inc. That compares with a 6.1 percent drop for total mobile-handset sales.

"The iPhone deal is a significant part of Telus’s plan to boost sales," said Jim Johannsson, a spokesman for the company. The fact that Telus and Bell announced the iPhone deal on the same day isn’t a signal that the two companies plan to sell mobile phones together, Johannsson was quick to point out.

The agreement with Apple “is leading to a leveling of the field in terms of higher speeds and access to mobile handsets,” said Greg MacDonald, an analyst at National Bank in Toronto. “It will impact Rogers only in the near term, however.”

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Source: Telus Corp and Bell Canada.