Today SaskTel announced that the residents of Deschambault Lake, Pelican Narrows, and Sandy Bay will now be able to enjoy the benefits of High Speed Internet that is more than 3 times faster than before.  SaskTel has upgraded the Internet service in these communities from 1.5 Mbps to 5 Mbps download speeds.

“Our government understands that High Speed Internet is essential for everyone, even for those who live in our remote northern communities,” said Dustin Duncan, Minister Responsible for SaskTel. “These latest upgrades will help to bridge the digital gap in northern Saskatchewan and provide access to equitable and comparable High Speed Internet.”

“SaskTel remains committed to our northern communities,” said Ron Styles, SaskTel President and CEO. “Despite the unique challenges that we face in providing services to the north, we understand how important access to fast and reliable High Speed Internet services are for the social and economic development of the residents in northern communities.”  

These latest upgrades are a result of two essential investments that SaskTel made in Northeastern Saskatchewan.  In June of this year, SaskTel completed a 3 year $30 million project, in partnership with Cameco and SaskPower, to rebuild the backhaul network in Northeastern Saskatchewan to significantly increase the bandwidth available through the region.  Shortly thereafter, SaskTel completed a $3.5 million project to increase the transport capacity from Cumberland House to Sandy Bay using Ethernet radio technology.

Added Styles “SaskTel will continue to strive to bring at least 5 Mbps High Speed Internet to all of the communities throughout Saskatchewan.”

About SaskTel

SaskTel is the leading Information and Communications Technology (ICT) provider in Saskatchewan, with over $1.2 billion in annual revenue and approximately 1.4 million customer connections including 617,000 wireless accesses, 395,000 wireline network accesses, 272,000 Internet accesses and over 110,000 maxTV™ subscribers. SaskTel and its wholly-owned subsidiaries offer a wide range of ICT products and services including competitive voice, data and Internet services, wireless data services, maxTV services, data centre services, cloud-based services, security monitoring services, advertising services, and international software and consulting services. SaskTel and its wholly-owned subsidiaries have a workforce of approximately 4,000 full-time equivalent employees (FTEs). Visit SaskTel at sasktel.com.

For more information, please contact:

Greg Jacobs, SaskTel Manager of External Communications
Phone: 306.777.3433 
Email: Greg.Jacobs@sasktel.com