Mountain Cable was founded and owned by the Boris Family. About 5 years ago they took a different tack and hired John Piercy, an ex-AllStream and Bell executive to build a voice business. John looked back to his old company and hired Allstream to assist in building a first class home phone service. The success showed in the numbers. Upon the sale Mountain Cable had 27,000 voice customers out of 41,000 cable customers, and impressive 65% penetration rate – all those customers being a loss to Bell’s local service.

Mountain Cable was known for having excellent customer service. Friends who lived in the area confirm this. It’s rare when you talk to someone who really says “I love my cable company”. I certainly can’t say that in Toronto.

John has moved on to his next venture. Look out for Atria Networks – a combination of the local utility telecom companies which was consolidated and had an investment by Birch Hill Equity Partners, TD’s private equity arm. Good luck John.

As for Shaw’s new investment, one could argue that running a cable network a distance from the core business could be challenging. But Shaw has Big Pipe, and can connect the new service to their old network easily. Locals must be wondering whether the customer service will remain. Other observers might wonder whether Shaw will deal the subscribers to Rogers or Cogeco.