Tbaytel, formerly the Thunder Bay Telephone Company, is a municipally-owned telecommunications company operating in
Thunder Bay, Ontario
Thunder Bay is a city in and the seat of Thunder Bay District, Ontario, Canada. It is the most populous municipality in Northwestern Ontario and the second most populous (after Greater Sudbury) municipality in Northern Ontario. Its population i ...
,
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...
, and the surrounding area. Tbaytel's services include data, voice, wireless, internet, digital TV and security.
Tbaytel claims to have Northern Ontario's largest 4G Network within a 300,000 km
2 area providing coverage along major highway corridors from just west of
Sault Ste. Marie to the
Manitoba
Manitoba is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada at the Centre of Canada, longitudinal centre of the country. It is Canada's Population of Canada by province and territory, fifth-most populous province, with a population ...
border and north to
Red Lake and
Geraldton
Geraldton (Wajarri language, Wajarri: ''Jambinu'', Wilunyu language, Wilunyu: ''Jambinbirri'') is a coastal city in the Mid West (Western Australia), Mid West region of Western Australia, north of the state capital, Perth.
As of the , Geraldt ...
to the US border. Tbaytel operates HSPA+, LTE and 5G networks.
Presently, Tbaytel is the largest independently owned telecommunications provider in Canada. Tbaytel is wholly owned by the Corporation of the City of Thunder Bay. Tbaytel has paid dividends every year since the late 1990s to The City of Thunder Bay, with an annual dividend of approximately $3 million. Today this annual fixed dividend has increased to $17 million. As of 2017, total dividends paid by Tbaytel to the City of Thunder Bay exceed $200 million.
Services
Residential
*Wireless Service (
HSPA+
HSPA may refer to:
* High Speed Packet Access, a mobile broadband technology
* Hawaiian Sugar Planters' Association
Education
* High School Proficiency Assessment
* Humphrey School of Public Affairs, an American public policy school
* Hunte ...
/
LTE)
**Tbaytel Free Public Wi-Fi is Tbaytel's public Wi-Fi service. Available at various public locations throughout Thunder Bay, Dryden and Fort Frances for the public to use.
**Fixed Wireless Internet (also known as Canopy) to provide broadband internet services to rural addresses which currently are not serviced by wireline connections.
**5G, LTE and HSPA wireless networks available throughout Northwestern Ontario.
**Tbaytel currently offers limited
VoLTE service. Most voice traffic is routed through HSPA+, while data service can utilize LTE where available.
*High Speed Internet is Tbaytel's Internet and Data Services (Internet over
VDSL
Very high-speed digital subscriber line (VDSL) and very high-speed digital subscriber line 2 (VDSL2) are digital subscriber line (DSL) technologies providing data transmission faster than the earlier standards of asymmetric digital subscriber li ...
or
Optical fibre)
*Tbaytel TV (
Digital TV
Digital television (DTV) is the transmission of television signals using digital encoding, in contrast to the earlier analog television technology which used analog signals. At the time of its development it was considered an innovative adv ...
) is Tbaytel's
IPTV
Internet Protocol television (IPTV), also called TV over broadband, is the service delivery of television over Internet Protocol (IP) networks. Usually sold and run by a Telephone company, telecom provider, it consists of broadcast live telev ...
Services, including
High-definition television
High-definition television (HDTV) describes a television or video system which provides a substantially higher image resolution than the previous generation of technologies. The term has been used since at least 1933; in more recent times, it ref ...
, Restart TV and Whole Home PVR CraveTV is a subscription on-demand video streaming service available to Tbaytel TV subscribers.
*Tbaytel Security is Tbaytel's security monitoring service for home and business.
**Tbaytel offers Smart Home monitoring, Home Security and Personal Medical Alarms.
*tbaytel.net Email Services
*Local Access and Enhanced Services
*Long Distance Phone Services (over
POTS or
Optical fibre)
*Voice Mail Services
*Telephone and Equipment Rental
*Web Hosting and Website Design
Business
* Communication & Collaboration
* Managed Network Services
* Internet & Networks
* Wireless
* Security
History
The company was established in 1902, when
Thunder Bay Telephone was formed to connect the then-independent communities of
Port Arthur and
Fort William.
When Port Arthur and Fort William amalgamated to form
The City of Thunder Bay, Thunder Bay Telephone became a city department. In 2004, Thunder Bay Telephone was renamed to Tbaytel. Tbaytel also appointed its first Municipal Services Board in 2004, allowing it to be operated independently, but it remained 100% owned and operated by the City of Thunder Bay.
Technological and service advances
* In 1902,
Isaac Lamont Matthews (Mayor of Port Arthur) and
Joshua Dyke (Mayor of Fort William) made the first phone call in the area.
* In 1926, the first long-distance call was completed between the mayors of Fort William and Winnipeg
* In 1949, direct dial calling was available. The first call was made between
Hubert Badanai (Mayor of Fort William) and
Frederick Oliver Robinson (Mayor of Port Arthur)
* In 1958, mobile radio telephone service was introduced.
* In 1964, direct long-distance dialing came to Thunder Bay
* In 1975, Thunder Bay Telephone installed electronic stored switching equipment
* In 1981, the first digital switching equipment in Northwestern Ontario was installed in Thunder bay
* In 1984, Thunder Bay Telephone installed the first fibre optic cable in Thunder Bay between two exchanges located in Port Arthur and Fort William - spanning over 7 km.
* In 1990, Thunder Bay Telephone launched cellular services
* In 1996, Thunder Bay Telephone offered dial-up internet
* In 1999, Thunder Bay Telephone installed the first digital cellular site in Thunder Bay
* In 2000, Thunder Bay Telephone introduced High-Speed ADSL Internet service in Thunder Bay
* In 2006, Thunder Bay Telephone acquired Superior Wireless to improve cellular service throughout Northwestern Ontario
* In 2007, Tbaytel acquired Apex Security and began offering home security monitoring
* In 2010, Tbaytel announced a partnership with
Rogers Wireless
Rogers Wireless Inc. is a Canadian mobile network operator headquartered in Toronto, providing service nationally throughout Canada. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Rogers Communications. The company had revenues of just under $15.1 billion in ...
and launched a 3G HSPA network serving Northwestern Ontario
* On November 23, 2010, Tbaytel launched their Digital TV Service. At launch, the service provided HDTV, whole-home PVR and web-based scheduling of recordings using
Motorola
Motorola, Inc. () was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois. It was founded by brothers Paul and Joseph Galvin in 1928 and had been named Motorola since 1947. Many of Motorola's products had been ...
VIP2262 set-top boxes. This made Tbaytel the first telecommunications provider in the region to offer a five-product bundle
* In 2011, Tbaytel upgraded and rebranded its mobility network to a
4G HSPA+ Network
* In November 2012, Tbaytel purchased
Dryden Municipal Telephone Service's (DMTS) wireless subscriber base. The DMTS wireless network was shut down in December 2012
* In December 2012, Tbaytel signed a roaming agreement with KNet (Keewaytinook Okimakanak) to allow wireless customers to freely roam between communities north of Tbaytel's serving area and Tbaytel's existing infrastructure
* In 2013, Tbaytel began implementing Fibre to the home
* In 2013, Tbaytel launched Free Public WiFi hotspots throughout Thunder Bay
* On October 1, 2014, Tbaytel decommissioned its legacy CDMA network
* On March 23, 2015, Tbaytel launched a 4G LTE network in Thunder Bay utilizing the AWS spectrum
* In 2017, Tbaytel launched a second LTE carrier utilizing the 700 MHz frequency, which expands coverage and reliability of its LTE network
* On November 6, 2017, Tbaytel expanded its Fibre offerings to the town of
Fort Frances
Fort Frances is a town in, and the seat of, Rainy River District in Northwestern Ontario, Canada. The population as of the Canada 2021 Census, 2021 census was 7,466 Fort Frances is a popular fishing destination. It hosts the annual Fort Frances C ...
, making it Tbaytel's first regional wireline expansion
* On March 22, 2018, Tbaytel announced plans to deliver Tbaytel Fibre to residents and businesses in the City of
Dryden, with an anticipated launch date in 2019
*On January 24, 2019, Tbaytel officially launched Fibre service in the city of Dryden.
References
External links
*
{{Canadian ISP
Companies based in Thunder Bay
Companies owned by municipalities of Canada
Mobile phone companies of Canada
1902 establishments in Ontario
IPTV companies of Canada
Internet service providers of Canada
Municipal government of Thunder Bay
Canadian companies established in 1902
Telecommunications companies established in 1902