Cable Telephony's Effect on Canada's Telecom Market

The residential telephony market in Canada reached an inflection point between 2005 and 2006, declining significantly in residential wireline access. The market has seen an exponential rate of residential switched-access line loss to new competition from VoIP services, specifically from cable providers. Cable companies provided an estimated 2% of residential telephony access in 2005 with their VoIP services. But by the end of 2006, the number of cable VoIP telephony subscribers jumped to 9% of the residential market to a total of 1.1 million subscribers. In 2006, the market saw its largest growth year for cable telephony; and conversely, it was the largest year-over-year decline in residential switched access.