Northern Telephone sees itself as economic driver.

• Author: WALCHUK, KEVIN
• Position: Brief Article - Statistical Data Included

More than a communications solutions provider, Northern Telephone (NT) takes its role as a gateway to economic development in northeastern Ontario very seriously, says Dave McGirr, vicepresident of marketing and customer service at the Timmins-based company.

NT serves more than 66,000 residential and business customers across an 83,000-square-kilometre area from the town of Latchford in the south, northwest through the Highway 11 corridor including Kirkland Lake, Timmins, and Kapuskasing and just west of Calstock.

NT provides local access service, cellular telephone, paging and mobile satellite solutions through its subsidiary, NorTel Mobility to northeastern Ontario.

The company recently completed the installation of an Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) system that allows business customers access to a variety of products ranging from high-speed Internet to bandwidth intensive imaging solutions.

NT has an office dedicated to the specific needs of small and medium-sized business customers.

Service includes a network surveillance and maintenance centre that can answer repair calls seven day a week, 24 hours a day.

The newly established technology advances are beginning to take hold, McGirr says.

"We've gone from being behind to being ahead, technologically. You are not going to find the same level of deployment in too many other areas," he says. McGirr sees NT playing a...