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Copyright © 2007 by Caroline Van Hasselt All rights reserved. No part of this work covered by the copyright herein may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means—graphic, electronic or mechanical without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any request for photocopying, recording, taping or information storage and retrieval systems of any part of this book shall be directed in writing to The Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency (Access Copyright). For an Access Copyright license, visit www.accesscopyright.ca or call toll free 1-800-893-5777. Care has been taken to trace ownership of copyright material contained in this book. The publisher will gladly receive any information that will enable them to rectify any reference or credit line in subsequent editions. Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication Data Van Hasselt, Caroline, 1961- High wire act : Ted Rogers and the empire that debt built / Caroline Van Hasselt. Includes index. ISBN 978-0-470-15296-6 1. Rogers, Ted, 1933-. 2. Rogers Telecommunications Limited. 3. Businessmen—Canada— Biography. 4. Telecommunication—Canada—Biography. I. Title. TK5243.R6H38 2007 384.5092 C2007-902562-5 Production Credits Cover design: Ian Koo Interior text design: Natalia Burobina Printer: Quebecor World - Taunton John Wiley & Sons Canada, Ltd. 6045 Freemont Blvd. Mississauga, Ontario L5R 4J3 Printed in the United States of America 1 2 3 4 5 QW 11 10 09 08 07 Table of Contents Acknowledgments v Prologue: Not Your Average Cable Guy ix Act One: Radio Chapter 1: 3BP 3 Chapter 2: Club 405 19 Chapter 3: Rogers, Bassett and the BBG 29 Chapter 4: 680 Radio 45 Chapter 5: “The Hardest Fight of My Life” 63 Act Two: Cable Chapter 6: The Cable Guy 81 Chapter 7: Enter Phil Lind, the Banks and the CRTC 95 Chapter 8: Predatory Strike 113 Chapter 9: Taking on America: Part I: Urban Oil Wells 135 Chapter 10: Taking on America: Part II: A Hell of a Marriage 157 Chapter 11: Taking on America: Part III: Hell on Wheels 169 Act Three: Wireless Chapter 12: Cutting the Cord: The Birth of Cantel 199 Chapter 13: Twelve Months to Launch 233 Chapter 14: The Put 259 Chapter 15: Ownership Gambit 285 Act Four: Riverboat Gambler Chapter 16: Unitel: Here We Go Again 297 Chapter 17: Blood Sport 319 Chapter 18: WAVE Good-Bye 337 Chapter 19: The Terrible Nineties 355 Chapter 20: Fido, Heel 383 Chapter 21: A Mug’s Game 405 Chapter 22: The Five Final Years 427 Chapter 23: Are You Rogered? 453 Epilogue: Vindication 465 Appendix: A Ted Rogers Q&A 472 Endnotes 475 Partial Bibliography 509 Index 510 To my loving parents the late Rudolf J. Scholz and Bertha Van Hasselt-Scholz Acknowledgments The idea to write this book came to me when I was still working at Bloomberg News in Toronto. Inevitably, whenever I mentioned to friends, acquaintances or strangers that I was writing a book on Rogers, I elicited an earful of complaints, ranging from exorbitant wireless charges to malfunctioning pvrs that mysteriously erased recorded movies. People didn’t confine their venting to Rogers either. Telus and Bell also drew complaints. Indeed, the only topic Canadians seem to complain about more than the weather is their telecom service. Love him or hate him, Ted Rogers has been a pervasive force in Canada for almost 50 years. The fascinating aspect of this tale for me is that however much technology has thrust change on Canadians, the issues of culture, scarcity of capital, and foreign ownership have remained virtually unchanged. The country continually goes through one convulsion or another over the same issues every decade or so. Although this book is unauthorized, Ted Rogers graciously cooperated. I owe him a debt of gratitude. He has been most patient and generous with his time. I am also deeply indebted to Phil Lind, who was equally generous with his time and afforded me access to Rogers’ personal daytimers. I also thank Jan Innes, Rci’s vice president of communications, for her help in arranging interviews and responding to my incessant queries, Rogers’ assistants, Jeannie Hastie and Maria Selina, and Rci’s corporate historian Ian Anthony. Where possible, I’ve tried to re-create events, although it is impossible to do so with complete accuracy when relying on people’s memories. Memories, as esteemed author Ken Auletta once wrote, tend to play tricks on participants. In recounting the tale of the making of Rci, I tried to present a fair and accurate portrayal of events and attempted to guard against revisionist history and | High Wire Act inaccuracies by checking with multiple sources. Where there are differences in recollection, I’ve either noted it within the text or in the endnotes. In chronicling the Rci story, I interviewed nearly 200 people. Many people spoke to me on the condition of anonymity and have not been quoted. Though their names cannot be mentioned here, I want them to know that I am deeply appreciative of their input and feedback. I thank everyone, who spoke on and off the record, for sharing and reliving their experiences with me. Their insights and contributions are imbedded throughout the book. I owe special thanks to Marc Belzberg, Robi Blumenstein, Philippe de Gaspé Beaubien, Gar Emerson, Nick Hamilton-Piercy, Nick Kauser, Doug Kirk, Robin Korthals, David Masotti, Craig McCaw, Brian Roberts, Loretta Rogers, John A. Tory, Burke van Valkenberg and Colin Watson. Since Rogers is easily one of Canada’s most written about business leaders, I am indebted to all of the journalists before me who have covered Rci. All interviews are mine unless otherwise noted. The only person who declined to be interviewed was bce’s Michael Sabia. Through his spokesman Ron Alepian, Sabia said he didn’t want “his words to appear in a book for posterity’’ because his comments about Rogers “might change.’’ I also thank Paul McLaughlin for his early encouragement and constructive feedback and give honorable mentions to Kevin Bell, Rachel Layne, Sara Monahan, Kathie O’Donnell and Rob Wells for their support—not to mention occasional access to the Bloomberg terminal. I am immensely grateful to Louise Ross, who cheerfully transcribed last-minute interview tapes, Jim Harrison, who provided valuable feedback, and Jennifer Garbin, who completed her Master of Divinity degree to become a reverend, while helping me transcribe interviews. Jennifer kept me laughing and always allowed me to bend her ear. Heather Wilson at the Joseph L. Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto was a godsend. She unearthed decades-old articles, crtc transcripts and obscure documents. I also thank the librarians at the crtc, the Cable Center in Denver and the Minneapolis Public Library for their assistance. For his sage counsel, I thank David Steinberg. Brian Rogers (no relation to Ted), who provided enthusiastic and helpful feedback on the manuscript, was wonderful and kept me out of trouble. Throughout, Tanya Crowell and Natasha Turner kept me physically healthy as I, in their words, obsessed over this book. I also thank Dr. Yvonne Verbeeten for her watchful care. Kevin Doyle, one of Canada’s most gifted and accomplished editors, who was Bloomberg Canada’s bureau chief and editor of Maclean’s magazine, has been an inspiration and mentor to me. Without his support in the early days of this project, it is unlikely that I would have pursued this adventure. He was a joy to work both for and with. I owe him a debt of gratitude. Acknowledgments | I am especially grateful to Don Loney, who supported me and embraced this book from the start, Pamela Vokey for her superb editorial counsel, and Jennifer Smith, the publisher at Wiley Canada, for her wholehearted commitment and enthusiasm. This book would not have been possible without the dedication and help of the talented team at Wiley. I must thank my family, especially my mother, for their support and continual laughter. My parents, who came to Canada as penniless European immigrants to carve out a new life, have always been my inspiration. My deepest sorrow is that my father, a spiritually strong man and my greatest supporter, died of prostate cancer before I could complete this book. Lastly, I give heartfelt thanks to Theresa Tedesco, a dear friend, for her enduring friendship, cheerful encouragement, and wise counsel over the years. With enormous patience and sensitivity, she helped me see this book through to its fruition and saved me from myself. It was her idea that I write this book and without her unwavering support, it would never have been written. While the players in the political, regulatory and commercial arenas have changed, Ted Rogers has remained� the one constant in the communications industry for almost 50 years. Indeed, the words of another outsized historical figure Theodore Roosevelt seem to be as apt today about Rogers, unbeaten and unbowed, as they were when Roosevelt spoke of the Man in the Arena in his famous Citizenship in a Republic speech at the Sorbonne in Paris in 1910: It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.