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Internet Activity in Canada
As stated on the e-commerce page of this report -- With respect to
Internet infrastructure to support e-commerce, world growth is moving at a
pace driven by activities in the USA. A leading indicator of the growth of
e-commerce on the Internet is the number of SSL servers in a particular
country. Of all OECD member countries, Canada has more secure servers than
any European country and is number six in the use of secure servers per
capita after the US, Iceland, Australia, New Zealand, and Luxembourg. An
indicator of the minimum size of a country's public Internet is the number
of Internet hosts and Canada is number five in Internet hosts per 1,000
inhabitants following Finland, the USA, Iceland, and Sweden. [Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
(OECD)]
The Internet Service Provider Market in Canada is growing at an
estimated rate of 35 percent based on 1998 activity data. The number of
providers grew from 550 to approximately 750 during that year and now more
ISP's are starting up in western Canada. The representative ISP is small,
with employee counts of 10 or less, has been in business for about four
years. The median annual revenue of ISP businesses is approximately
$500,000 and most indicate that their operations are profitable. Startup
costs for a small ISP business are relatively low and the demand for
service continues to grow. The number of Internet customer accounts has
grown over 50 percent since 1997 and 75 percent are residential
subscribers. Individual ISP's are providing a range of up to about 21
value-added services. These services vary by provider and include such
services as Web consulting, Web hosting, transaction settlement for
merchants, virtual private networks and, server co-location.
[Kern, Josh, ISP market
continues to show rapid growth]
It is estimated that about 50 percent of Canadian consumers could
access the Internet at the beginning of 1999. Of those, the usage in
individual provinces is as follows:
Applications used are as depicted here:
As of 1998 the Canadian Internet marketplace consisted of more than 700
Internet service providers, about one billion dollars in revenue, and a
growth rate of 5-8% per month. Lists of providers for Canada and other
countries can be found at Herbison
Consulting WWW site. The industry structure includes: (1) major
telecommunications companies and their affiliates, (2) cable companies and
affiliates, (3) independent ISP's, (4) large ISP's, (5) telephone exchange
carriers and affiliates and, (6) educational and provincial nets. Some of
the major participants are AOL Canada, PSI, iSTAR, Internet Direct,
Sprint, UUNet, and Netcom Canada. As of now with respect to this industry,
the government policy is to encourage self-regulation. [Canadian Association of Internet Providers
ISP
Industry overview: CAIP Presentation, April 29/99]
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