Mr. Wade Oosterman reports

BELL ACCELERATES EXPANSION OF 4G LTE WIRELESS SERVICE TO SMALL COMMUNITIES ACROSS CANADA

One hundred twenty more small communities across Quebec and Ontario have joined BCE Inc.'s Bell Mobility's world-leading 4G LTE wireless network. Employing new 700-megahertz (MHz) bandwidth and other spectrum assets, Bell is expanding fourth-generation (4G) LTE services to small towns, rural communities and remote locations in every region of Canada including the north. Bell earlier announced the launch of 4G LTE service in 52 small communities across all four provinces in Atlantic Canada and will make further LTE rollout announcements in 2015.

Bell LTE already covers 86 per cent of the national population and the company plans to bring its next-generation network to more than 98 per cent of Canadians this year with its continuing expansion to smaller communities.

"Bell is proud to offer consumers and businesses everywhere the benefits of high-quality, high bandwidth mobile data access made possible by LTE," said Wade Oosterman, president of Bell Mobility. "From Sainte-Anne-de-la-Pocatiere to Grafton, Pickle Lake to Bromont, customers can now access the same great broadband service and mobile applications as customers in major centres across Canada. For people living, working or travelling in rural Quebec and Ontario, wireless just got better."

Bell will be adding still more small communities to its 4G LTE coverage map throughout the year. In addition to the 120 smaller communities with new LTE service, Bell is also expanding LTE in and around a number of cities and towns where service has already been launched, including Peterborough, Maitland and North Bay in Ontario, and Rigaud, Saint-Alexandre-D'Iberville and Sainte-Julie in Quebec.

4G LTE is today's worldwide gold standard for wireless technology. To support its expansion to smaller communities, Bell is employing new 700 MHz spectrum, airwaves that provide both strong in-building connections and reliable coverage over longer distances, vital to network expansion in rural Canada. Bell acquired a significant amount of 700 MHz spectrum in every national market in the federal government's spectrum auction early in 2014, and in April was the first company in Canada to launch 700 MHz LTE service.

Since 2006, Bell has invested over $7-billion to build its advanced wireless networks across the country. With Bell's significant investments in mobile broadband networks and service innovation, Canadians are rapidly adopting smart phones and quickly becoming world leaders in usage of on-the-go data services like mobile TV and mobile banking.