Definition of the relevant market for wholesale wireline high-speed transport services in Canada

The CRTC requires the Contractor to: i. Assist CRTC staff in designing, collecting, and analyzing relevant marketplace information necessary to support a market definition exercise, as needed.

ii. Collect and analyze information describing the products currently available that are or could be used to offer wholesale wireline high-speed transport services in Canada, including their locations, capacity and limitations in the provisions of such wholesale wireline high-speed transport services. This assessment should include, but not be limited to, the services listed in Telecom Decision 2008-17.

iii. Conduct an in-depth analysis of the services considered in ii. above, to determine whether each would be in the relevant product market for wireline high-speed transport services, including a description and assessment of which factors and considerations were used to determine whether the services could be considered substitutes.

iv. Provide description and assessment of telecom network configuration and competitor requirements for purchasing transport services, plus the different types of geographic markets that could be considered the smallest area where consumers would not be willing to switch supplier. Different sizes and types of geographic markets should be considered, including points of interconnection, routes, exchanges, regions, provinces.

v. Conduct an analysis of the geographic markets considered in iv. to determine the most relevant for the defining the wholesale wireline high-speed transport services market in Canada, including a description and assessment of which factors and considerations were used to determine whether the geographic market is small enough to warrant switching.

vi. Draft a definition of the wholesale wireline high-speed transport services market in Canada. The definition should be concise, precise, comprehensive and allow for upcoming technological changes, and include: a. The relevant product market, which involves an assessment of the group of products that consumers would consider to be substitutes for the service. b. The relevant geographic market for a product or service, which involves assessing the geographic area in which a customer purchases a service and whether or not a customer would be willing to switch from a supplier in one area to a supplier in another area.