Summary

  • Rogers and Timeless both backed Rogers’s offer; the CRTC made that selection binding and set OneSoccer’s linear rate.
  • The published decision gives neither the amount nor an effective date; the CRTC says it did not need to weigh market-value factors.

Analysis

On 30 October, the CRTC selected Rogers Communications Canada’s offer in its final-offer arbitration with Timeless Inc. That choice set OneSoccer’s linear rate; the published decision gives no amount or effective date.

The ruling closes the remedy phase of a case that began with a different finding. In March 2023, the CRTC concluded that Rogers’s refusal to carry OneSoccer on its distribution systems gave Rogers an undue preference and put Timeless at an undue disadvantage. It ordered the parties to propose remedies. The 2026 arbitration narrowed that work to the linear rate. It began on 24 February; a 7 July conduct letter set the scope.

Final-offer arbitration is built for a hard choice: the Commission selects one offer, normally as a whole, and its decision binds both sides. The CRTC says it may reject both only in very exceptional circumstances. Here, the parties removed the contest themselves. Because they agreed on Rogers’s offer, the Commission said it did not need to assess fair-market-value factors or broadcasting-policy objectives.

That shortcut settled the rate without showing readers the price. The decision says most information about the offers was filed in confidence and that some financial information would not be made public. Its reasons name the selected offer but give no numeric rate. The CRTC says its earlier undue-preference finding is remedied because the rate for carriage has now been established.

Rate was the whole assignment. Rogers also asked the Commission to address a separate Part 1 application by Timeless about how OneSoccer would be packaged. The CRTC ruled that request outside the arbitration’s scope. The rate decision therefore does not resolve that separate packaging question.

The public reasons list no amount or effective date. Either would show what the agreed rate costs and when linear carriage begins. For now, the public can verify the binding outcome and the CRTC’s conclusion, but cannot read the price from the decision.

Sources