Sunday, March 06, 2011

Quebecor paces acceleration of wireless wars


Jamie Sturgeon | Financial Post | Sept. 6, 2010

TORONTO -- When Vidéotron Ltée chief executive Robert Dépatie confidently beamed this past spring that his Quebecor Inc. telecom division was “on the verge of launching Quebec’s most competitive and complete wireless service,” many believed a splashy launch was imminent.

June gave way to July, then August. It is now September, and Quebecor is ready for take-off, saying in a company release today service will be turned on Thursday.

Start your engines.

As the first of two well-entrenched cable incumbents to bring on wireless services this year and next, Montreal-based Vidéotron’s long-awaited entrance into Quebec’s wireless market represents a significant shift for the industry.

Analysts are taking Mr. Dépatie’s words seriously, and so is the competition. “Long-term, Vidéotron has great potential to make a lot of money out of wireless in Quebec,” Maher Yaghi at Desjardins Securities says.

He and others expect the firm to begin immediately stealing market share from wireless incumbents Toronto-based Rogers Communications Inc., BCE Inc.’s Bell Mobility, also of Montreal, and Vancouver-based Telus Corp. through a strategy built around bundling affordable mobile services into household cable, Internet and phone products Vidéotron already sells to its 1.8 million customers.

The company will offer 30-40% discounts to the incumbent wireless operators’ voice and data pricing in Quebec if customers take wireless as part of a bundle, Dvai Ghose, analyst at Canaccord Genuity said in a note Tuesday.

"[The] aggressive wireless price points ... will force Bell, Rogers and Telus to respond," he said.

Most stock analysts following Quebecor like Vidéotron's chances. Of 13 covering the firm, 10 rate it a “buy” or “sector outperform,” according to Bloomberg. Three, including Mr. Yaghi and analysts at TD Newcrest and Credit Suisse, rank the shares as a “hold.”

Vidéotron cut its teeth in wireless in 2006 when it partnered with Rogers in a resale deal that slapped its branding on phones that ran over the incumbent’s network.

But since paying Industry Canada more than half a billion dollars to secure its own wireless licences in 2008 and constructing a 3G+ network across its wireline territory, the most important growth engine for Vidéotron is now ready for prime time.

Mr. Yaghi conservatively suggests Vidéotron will win 45,000 customers before the end of the year, and will have attracted 165,000 through 2011. Combined with its existing 87,000 wireless clients — equal to about 2% of the Quebec market — Vidéotron will boast a subscriber base of a quarter of a million customers 15 months from now.

With nearly 40% of Quebec’s 4.3 million wireless customers toting a Bell device, it is no surprise the cross-town giant has been aggressively courting Quebeckers with discounts on Internet and TV alongside home-phone. It is part of Bell’s strategy to win the entire “broadband home” away from Vidéotron. Instead of the pesky cableco stealing its wireless business, Bell will take Vidéotron’s Internet and cable accounts, and if it can, reclaim home-phone customers, too.

"You'll see much more product and marketing development towards owning the entire household over the coming period," Kevin Crull, chief of Bell's residential services said in an interview last week.

Irrespective of whoever wins this tug of war, industry-wide disruption is expected.

Pricing has been guarded like a state secret. But there are good odds that Vidéotron will introduce some form of unlimited calling. There are ads floating around Quebec now suggesting customers will no longer have to fret over how many minutes remain on their plan.

If true, it could hold huge ramifications not just for major rival Bell, but the sector. So far, incumbents have steadfastly resisted introducing any unlimited options in their main brands, which consist of hugely profitable users paying high prices for buckets of minutes and data, usually shackled to a contract.

It is a cash cow Vidéotron now threatens to undermine in its bid to win share in Quebec. “If Vidéotron comes out and offers unlimited local calling, that could be a game-changer,” said one analyst who asked not to be named.

“Bell can’t stand still and not offer it,” he said. “And if they do it in Montreal they’ll have a hard time not doing it in Ontario.”

An unlimited offering from Bell in Ontario may provoke a swift response from Rogers, threatening to dent wireless earnings at both firms. With almost 50% share in Ontario, it is Rogers' most important wireless market.

Telus, the No.3 carrier in the country, is the incumbent with the least amount of exposure in Quebec (or Ontario for that matter), meaning it does not face the level of immediate pressure Rogers or Bell do. But with Calgary's Shaw Communications Inc. preparing to integrate wireless services with its household bundles next year, a similar scenario awaits in Western Canada, as well.

China's Huawei looks on Ottawa to smooth entry into US market

Jamie Sturgeon | Financial Post | Aug. 28, 2010

Huawei Technologies Co. may be looking to the city of Ottawa and the domestic telecom market to help ease tensions between the Chinese network-maker and Washington.

Huawei strengthened ties with the city by taking membership in tech incubator Ottawa Centre for Research and Innovation. The move follows the opening of research labs in the region this spring and a commitment of $50 million to R&D.

Huawei's immediate interest in Canada stems from contracts with BCE Inc.'s Bell Canada, Telus Corp. and SaskTel. But the deepening connection likely holds another motive, analysts suggest -- establishing a beachhead for entry into the United States, a market the Chinese firm has coveted for years but has faced stiff opposition from some U.S. lawmakers.

"Their eyes have been set on cracking the (U.S.) telecom sector forever," said Jon Arnold, principal analyst at Arnold & Associates Ltd. in Toronto.

The need for Shenzhen-based Huawei to make inroads in North America is increasing. In the last year, chief competitors have taken major positions in Canada as U.S. carriers move to upgrade mobile networks and Canadian providers such as Bell, Telus and Rogers Communications Inc. prepare to follow suit.

Last summer, Sweden's Ericsson AB, the largest telecom equipment maker in the world, outbid European rival Nokia Siemens Networks for Nortel Networks' wireless division. In July, NSN enlarged its presence by gobbling up Motorola Inc.' s network operations (and was rewarded with a $7-billion U.S. deal from Harbinger Capital Partner to build a next-generation network).

Huawei's biggest opponents may reside in Washington, where deep skepticism persists over the company's rumoured ties to Chinese military, among other allegations.

Last week, senior Republicans advised the White House to block Huawei from supplying Sprint Nextel with network equipment because of national security concerns. Similar warnings forced Huawei to drop a bid for 3Com in 2008.

"Every time they've tried to gain entry into the American market, they've been almost completely unsuccessful," said Lee Ratliff, analyst at iSuppli Corp.

Now, Huawei is pursuing deeper ties in Canada. Since winning contracts with Bell and Telus to build their joint 3G+ network last year, the firm established R&D facilities in Ottawa in April. It is hiring from the talent left behind from Nortel's departure.

Membership into OCRI gives Huawei "an opportunity to show they're committed and here for the long term," said Claude Haw, chief executive of the regional trade body. Fellow members include Telus, Rogers and Research In Motion Ltd.

Yet some, like Arnold, see the aim of the moves as a way to smooth relations with the United States. By establishing a record north of the border, fears may be allayed, he said.

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Newser: Wireless startups taking share from Rogers, Bell, Telus: report


Jamie Sturgeon | Victoria Times-Colonist | July 28, 2010

TORONTO -- Canada’s new wireless providers are luring subscribers from incumbents Rogers Communications Inc., Bell Canada and Telus Corp., rather than attracting customers who are picking up a cellphone for the first time, according to one of the first detailed looks at the new competition.

The revelation, among other developments, may revive concerns among investors that upstart players will wreak more havoc in the country’s traditionally staid $16-billion mobile market than has been assumed, while the established firms are likely to hit at their own bottom lines to guard market share, analysts say.

“Hide from wireless,” Jeff Fan at Scotia Capital recommended to clients in a note published Monday. “We expect competition risk.”

About three-quarters of all subscribers with Wind Mobile, Mobilicity and Public Mobile have been cherry-picked from the three major incumbents, a report from Scotia Capital says. It is a higher percentage than some thought would prevail, and could contribute to more aggressive efforts to retain customers at Rogers, Bell and Telus, which together currently control about 96% of the wireless market.

One rumour is that Rogers is set to introduce a new discount brand called “Chat.r.”

Rogers’ new brand would be aimed directly at the area in which new entrants are having the most success: low-income, city dwellers and immigrant communities that want cheap, unlimited voice and text services.

Chat.r will launch during the all-important back-to-school season, typically the highest selling period for a carrier alongside Christmas. Unlike Rogers’ current discount brand Fido, the new service will be completely prepaid with no contracts, closely mirroring the most attractive plans offered by the three new entrants, sources said.

Chat.r will stem subscriber losses for Rogers but at a price. The telecom behemoth will take a hit on the average revenue per user (ARPU) it generates per month, which currently stands at $62.02, the highest among Canadian carriers.

Rogers declined to comment on Chat.r.

“We’re always working to innovate and better serve Canadians, but have nothing to announce at this time,” said Odette Coleman, Rogers’ director of communications.

A new launch would have broad implications for the market. Bell and Telus will almost certainly move to match any repricing while new entrants will also react, threatening all with a punishing price war. “Our concern is that it will ignite retaliations,” Mr. Fan said.

After much uncertainty and — unfounded — anxiety last year, the market has mostly dismissed the new-entrant risk through fiscal 2010. Rogers, Bell and Telus have all seen their stocks rally (as much as 20% in Telus’s case) as ARPU has stabilized and performances have rebounded against weak year-ago comparables.

There may be room left in the run-up as solid second-quarter results are expected again at the end of the month. Yet after that, valuations will be hard-pressed to justify such levels, some say.

“We urge incumbent wireless investors not to be complacent,” Dvai Ghose, analyst at Canaccord Genuity said in a note late last week. The analyst also foresees downward price pressure ahead, especially in Eastern Canada.

In Quebec, Vidéotron Ltée. will launch wireless at the end of summer with aggressive discounts, particularly on data plans which could come in 40% cheaper than current incumbent pricing. Vidéotron operates in Montreal and surrounding areas, but a price cut there could prompt restive customers in other areas to barter for the same.

“Rogers and Bell are particularly susceptible as they enjoy industry leading market share in Ontario and Quebec,” Mr. Ghose said.

With the ability to bundle Internet, phone and TV services, Videotron is expected to experience more sustained success in the wireless market than Wind, Mobilicity or Public Mobile. Despite garnering most of their customers from incumbents, new entrants are believed to be tracking below their own estimates and even the more tempered expectations of analysts.

All four firms won licences to operate cellphone businesses at the 2008 wireless spectrum auction. Wind has been rolling out services across Canada since its December launch, while Mobilicity and Public Mobile began operating in Toronto in May.

jasturgeon@nationalpost.com


Earnings preview: Telecoms before the storm

By Jamie Sturgeon | Vancouver Sun | July 25, 2010

With the economy sending mixed signals, markets have been dicey for months. But there have been pockets of calm, and in particular Canada’s telecom sector, which has enjoyed steady gains against the S&P Canadian benchmark index in 2010.

Investors should not be surprised. For years now, wireless profits have fuelled enviable cash flows and solid earnings growth at Rogers Communications Inc., BCE Inc. and Telus Corp. In recent quarters, each firm has diligently spun out more and more cash to stockholders in the form of dividend hikes while Rogers and Bell have been busy buying back shares, making owning one if not all three a must for value seekers.

As Rogers kicks off second-quarter earnings season this week, the good times are expected to continue. “It will be relatively consistent for the big three,” Phillip Huang, analyst at UBS says, echoing the consensus view on Bay Street.

But good times have a history of ending and some, including Mr. Huang, believe the horizon on the sector’s safe-haven status appears fast-approaching.

“I would characterize it as the calm before the storm, especially if you’re looking at the wireless side,” he said.

The reason for the growing pessimism stems from fresh competition from stalwart cable firms now arming themselves with wireless, and cellphone startups that have recently entered market. Both forces threaten to dent the sector’s impressive cash-generating powers in the second half of the year, some say, and beyond.

On Tuesday, Bay Street expects Rogers to report earnings of 67¢ a share on revenues of $3.026-billion. One focus will be on wireless profit margins, which are expected to continue to fatten. Rogers has been the most aggressive of the big three telecoms in marketing smartphones to existing subscribers and new customers. It was the exclusive Canadian provider of the iPhone up until last November, and as more subsidy costs on expensive handsets are made back, margins are expected to rise among those users, which accounted for a third of its eight-million-plus base in the first quarter.

Many expect that higher mobile data revenues will help Rogers sail past Street estimates and adjust its outlook higher.

“Based on stronger wireless margins, we believe RCI will tweak and raise 2010 guidance this quarter,” Jonathan Allen of RBC Capital Markets wrote in July 7 note.

But margin gains reflects slowing growth. Wireless margins are rising because the amount Rogers is spending to subsidize new smartphones is decreasing as fewer new customers are signed up. New competition from the likes of Wind Mobile may be having some effect in core marketssuch as the Greater Toronto Area. But BCE’s Bell Mobility, once the third-place runner in wireless, is likely the greater concern for Rogers.

Bell has been steadily gaining ground since activating its new wireless network last fall, and is again expected to show robust customer additions when it reports on Aug. 5. A marketing barrage led by its sponsorship of the Vancouver Winter Games led to a blockbuster first quarter. Wireless additions are expected to moderate, but Bell may still add as many as 100,000 new subscribers in the spring compared to 90,000 at Rogers.

“Bell will again win market share away from Rogers. New entrants, as well, but to a lesser extent,” Dvai Ghose at Canaccord Genuity said.

The downside is that Bell faces a period of cost pressures as subsidies for iPhones and BlackBerries will be heftier than peers. But Bay Street expects Bell to report profit of 73¢ a share and revenue of $3.78-billon. Another 5% hike to the dividend to $1.83 is almost a lock, following a 7% hike at the end of 2009.

The leveling playing field in wireless between Bell and Rogers also sets the stage for a fierce battle for television subscribers once Bell introduces its new IP television product in Toronto and other markets this year.

As for Telus, the market will be watching whether a very promising start to the year can be maintained when it reports on Aug. 6. RBC’s Mr. Allen called Telus’s first-quarter performance a “turning point” as it recovered from a bruising 2009 which saw wireless revenues per subscriber fall the sharpest among the big firms, and intense competition from Western Canada cable giant Shaw Communications Inc. accelerate home-phone customer losses.

“Telus was arguably the hardest hit by the economy and competition last year,” Mr. Allen said.

But now Telus is hitting back. An aggressive roll out of its rival IP-based television and Internet product bundle, called Optik, is seeing gains against Shaw, and the benefits of cost-cutting efforts have started to pay off. The Street expects the Vancouver-based firm to report 76¢ a share in profit on $2.42-billion revenue and a performance in line with the high end of its full-year guidance.

Telus shares have climbed the highest among the big three this year, appreciating more than 20%, compared to gains of 9% and 13% for Bell and Rogers, respectively.

Average monthly revenues collected per subscriber (ARPU) are also expected show stabilization. Competitive pressures and lower overall usage because of a dismal economy saw voice fees cut last year and data usage fail to make up the difference.

“Declines are going to be much more modest this quarter than what we’ve seen,” Canaccord’s Mr. Ghose said.

Greg MacDonald of National Bank Financial said the quarter will show that wireless data revenues are beginning to buoy and even lift overall ARPU levels at the big three, even as they continue to lower pricing on mobile call charges due to new competition. “I’m looking for flat blended ARPU because of the data growth you’re seeing, despite high single digit erosion on voice,” he said.

Picking a winner among Rogers, Bell and Telus for the quarter can be debated. Investors have flocked to all three this year to take advantage of healthy dividend payouts that are second-best among Canadian stocks as a group (5.5% on average vs. 5.6% among utilities), and have steadily risen.

“All three have done really well,” Juliette John, portfolio manager for Bissett Investment Management’s dividend funds. She manages $750-million, of which 12% is spread across the three telecoms. “They’re considered a bit more conservative and that has become much appreciated I think. And of course that yield is really attractive.”

What cannot be argued is that they all face intensifying competitive pressure going forward, with no consensus on what the impact will be. “If equity markets remain volatile, then a position in telecom for another couple of months may still be attractive,” Mr. Allen said. “But we recommend that investors consider trimming positions as the year progresses.”

Rogers announced at the end of June it would launch “chatr”, and new discount brand to rival offerings from Wind and other upstarts Public Mobile and Mobilicity, which began offering services in key markets in May. Chatr would also preempt a wireless launch from Quebec cable power Videotron Ltee. this summer, and Shaw next year.

The fear is that the move will provoke aggressive responses from Bell and Telus, and perhaps trigger a price war, dragging down profits across the $16-billion sector.

“I’m not so much concerned about the standalone new entrants, even Videotron and Shaw,” UBS’s Mr. Huang said. “The real worry is about what the incumbents do to themselves.”

Canada’s wireless market is maturing and as the race for the last subscribers ensues, margins and revenues may be sacrificed to guard and gain share. Marketing costs are expected to soar in the current quarter.

Some, like Canaccord’s Mr. Ghose say the competition is having a greater effect than is realized. “I believe the new entrants have taken more share than what equity markets think,” he said.

Still, all three have the wherewithal to continue raising dividends and buying back shares. Dips in valuation in the coming months can even provide buying opportunities, Bissett’s Ms. John said.

“New entrants could create hiccups, but that could serve as buying opportunities,” she says, “depending on how aggressive all of the players become.”


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FEATURE: DATA TSUNAMI, and how we can avoid it


By Jamie Sturgeon | Canada.com | July 10, 2010

Ever heard of an exabyte? Probably not since it is a unit of measurement so vast that there hasn’t been a need to think about it until recently. The term is a metric, like the much smaller giga or megabyte, that is used to quantify digital data.

By some estimates an exabyte, or EB, is equal to about 50,000 years of high-quality DVD video. Times that by five, and that is how much data is being consumed across global wireless networks annually as ever more BlackBerries, iPhones, mobile modems and now tablet computers attach themselves to the World Wide Web.

And it has only just begun.

From five EBs currently consumed a year, that figure is expected to surge to 50 within four years, according to European network maker Ericsson AB.

“It’s a challenge for carriers,” said Mark Henderson, chief executive of Ericsson Canada at the Canadian Telecom Summit, an annual spring gathering of the industry’s top minds.

Will networks — including Canada’s — be able to cope?

Some do not think so. Jennifer Pigg, vice-president of research for Yankee Group, says “carriers haven’t prepared” for what she calls a data “tsunami” that has already started to clog up networks.

And mobile broadband hasn’t even hit the mainstream. Although accelerated by Apple’s iPhone launch a few years ago, the spectre of a tidal wave of wireless data has only come to the fore in the last 12 months.

AT&T and other major carriers in the United States are already experiencing network congestion resulting in dropped calls, sluggish transfer speeds and other periodic disruptions in certain high-use zones like New York and San Francisco.

“The few, the proud — the AT&Ts — have been the first out of the bunker if you will, and have taken some unexpected shock. Clearly, carriers didn’t realize [the data explosion] would have such a huge impact,” Ms. Pigg says.

Yankee Group suggests that wireless data traffic will increase 10 to 30 times over and above today’s usage within three to five years. Global wireless capacity, on the other hand, will grow to only four times the current bandwidth availability — nowhere near what’s required.

Canada may be more prepared than other nations. From national incumbents Rogers Communications Inc., Bell Canada and Telus Corp., to new startups like Wind Mobile and Mobilicity, Canadian carriers have poured a combined $6-billion since 2008 into building out modern data-centric networks and ballooning the country’s bandwidth capacity.

The majority of Canadian carriers possess advanced high-speed packet access “plus” (HSPA+) systems — the gold standard of modern wireless networks, capable of delivering data transfer speeds of between seven and 21 megabytes per second. That’s on par with fixed-line broadband connections. Moreover, these networks can readily be upgraded to next-generation 4G standards specifically designed to handle massive data loads.

“I think Canadian carriers have done a great job of keeping up with some of the most advanced data networks you see today,” said Ericsson’s Mr. Henderson. “We’re world-class at this point.”

The crowning achievement came last November when Bell and Telus turned on their joint HSPA+ network blanketing 93% of the population. Far more than just providing cellphone services to new areas, the billion-dollar undertaking introduced high-speed Internet to thousands of communities for the first time, bridging the digital divide for untold numbers of rural Canadians.

“The reality is, in Canada we have good service in broadband despite what some studies say,” says Greg MacDonald, telecom analyst at National Bank Financial. “We have high penetration of data at attractive rates. And for a country of this size, the coverage we have is phenomenal.”

Rates are debatable, with Canadian consumers paying higher prices than most other places. But what is certain is that Canada has world-class 3G coverage. Of about 20 large-scale HSPA+ networks operating throughout the world, Canada boasts three, according to the GSM Association, which tracks global deployment.

But even the industry admits demand is soaring and the clock is ticking.

“They are extremely well-prepared, there’s been massive investment. But that’s for now,” said Bernard Lord, president of the Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association, of the state of Canada’s networks. “To keep up with demand, there will be much more investment required.”

Signs that demand threatens to overwhelm supply have already appeared. Bell has twice flirted with a capacity crunch. At the Vancouver Olympic Winter Games, Sidney Crosby’s gold medal-clinching goal in overtime saw a torrent of texts, streaming video and other data requests flood the network in a single, historic burst of wireless activity.

Those signals got through, but Stephen Howe, Bell’s chief technology officer, said the burst came close to exceeding what the carrier provisioned for. “With Sidney’s goal, we nearly hit capacity,” he said.

It happened again in April, during Game 7 of Montreal’s epic series with Washington during the National Hockey League playoffs. “Even though we added further capacity from the Olympics, in that short period of time we were already experiencing yet again huge growth in volume,” he said.

Every Canadian carrier is closely watching how others are managing.

“It’s not that bad things will happen if we continue on the same path — bad things are happening,” Mr. MacDonald said. “So you start questioning what the solutions are.”

Fortunately, fixes are emerging. “What AT&T — and Rogers and Bell and everybody — is doing, once they realize there is this stress on the network, is to make it as efficient as possible,” said Amit Kaminer, analyst at SeaBoard Group in Toronto.

In May, AT&T eliminated its flat-rate, unlimited data plan in favour of a tiered pricing system based on capped usage. The move limits usage to 2 gigabytes, and charges overage fees to users that exceed that. A second, less-expensive plan gives customers 200 megabytes, or enough to check emails and browse the Web. Analysts say the move better reflects current customer habits while mitigating network stress.

AT&T is also leading the charge in channeling traffic into manageable pools. In late May, it announced that it would set up a local Wi-Fi zone over Times Square in an effort to ease the load on the parent network.

“We’re just starting to find out the consumption patterns and usage on mobile data devices. It took us a couple of years to understand [cellular] voice. It took us a couple years to understand SMS [text flows]. It will take us a couple years to understand data,” Mr. Kaminer said.

Most of the ingredients are in place now to avoid the crunch. Leading microwave “backhaul” technology made by Ottawa-based DragonWave Inc. and others is available to efficiently beam huge amounts of traffic from cell towers into core networks and out to end users.

Other 4G technologies, like more efficient tower cells and data management software systems — collectively known as long-term evolution, or LTE — are already being deployed in the United States and will likely be introduced by Canadian carriers starting in 2012, said Mr. Howe at Bell.

But more efficient networks are only one side of solving the data equation. “The other thing that is fundamental to all this is the availability of spectrum. That’s the real estate we need to be able to deliver services,” said Mr. Lord, a former premier of New Brunswick who joined the wireless lobby association in October 2008.

Spectrum refers to the radio frequency bands wireless traffic flows over. It is a finite resource, which communications providers must share with others, like radio and television companies as well as government.

And more spectrum will be required by carriers.

Adrian Foster, a partner at Ottawa telecom consultants Mclean Foster & Co., and co-author of a recent policy paper released by think-tank C.D. Howe Institute, said that only about half of the spectrum that will be required in the next several years has been allotted.

If supply is to keep up, regulators and Industry Canada must speed up the process of parceling off more airwaves for communications companies. Ottawa is dragging its feet while countries in Europe and the United States are quickly advancing into 4G standards.

“What we’re primarily suggesting is we have gridlock,” Mr. Foster said of the regulatory environment. Waiting too long to free up more spectrum, specifically the 700-megahertz band now occupied by television broadcasters, will mean Canada will fall behind.

A new auction is expected to take place either next year or in 2012, but Ottawa has given no public indication of a concrete timeframe.

“The government has to make decisions,” Mr. Lord said.

On top of the 700MHz bands, another swath of spectrum in the 2.5GHz range is also being eyed for auction. Together, both would go a long way in ensuring Canadian wireless users are not faced with a capacity crunch.

To be sure, Bell and others have room to spare today — Bell has not yet needed to tap spectrum it acquired during Industry Canada’s last auction in 2008 — but demand is climbing fast. In some cases, it is a full year ahead of estimates, Mr. Howe said.

“There is a need for more spectrum, more backhaul — there are challenges,” Mr. Kaminer said, yet he quickly adds: “But we’re not working in a vacuum. There are a lot of companies and people working on this.”

jasturgeon@nationalpost.com