Rogers Communications Founder Ted Rogers Inducted Into Wireless Hall of Fame

TORONTO, Oct 8 /CNW/ – Rogers Communications Inc. (TSX: RCI.A, RCI.B and
NYSE: RCI) today announced that its founder, the late Edward S. “Ted”
Rogers, has been inducted into the international Wireless History
Foundation Hall of Fame.

Mr. Rogers, who passed away in December 2008 at age 75, founded what
became Rogers Communications in 1960 when he borrowed $85,000 to
purchase fledgling FM radio station CHFI in Toronto. Today, RCI is an
investment grade, $12 billion a year company supplying millions of
Canadians with wireless phone and data service, cable-TV, high-speed
Internet, home phone service, and media content through magazines, radio
and television programming.

Mr. Rogers‘ posthumous induction took place at the gala dinner of the
Wireless History Foundation at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco on
October 5. Melinda M. Rogers, who is RCI’s Senior Vice President
Strategy and Development, accepted the award on behalf of the family and
company.

“Until his death two years ago, dad was often dubbed a ‘media mogul’ and
a ‘cable czar’,” Ms Rogers said. “But arguably his greatest success came
in wireless telecommunications.”

Today, Rogers is the largest wireless telecommunications company in
Canada with 56 per cent of its revenue and 70 per cent of its profit
coming from wireless. But in 1983 when Ted Rogers went to his board of
directors asking for $500,000 to invest in the new technology, he was
voted down because the company carried too much debt. Ted then invested
his own money and was a founding partner in Cantel, Canada’s first
national cellular phone company that later became wholly-owned by Rogers.

“He was a driving force, a visionary, a pioneer and a titan across the
wide spectrum of communications,” said Melinda Rogers. “Honouring his
legacy by the Wireless History Foundation is truly appreciated by the
Rogers family and I know dad would be delighted, too.”

The Wireless History Foundation was created in 2008 “…to educate and
inspire future generations about the significance and growth of the
wireless communications industry.” Rogers was inducted along with
wireless industry pioneers LeRoy T. “Roy” Carlson, founder of Telephone
and Data Systems (TDS) Inc.; Stanley T. Sigman, former CEO of AT&T
Mobility; and Raymond C. Trott, founder of Trott Communications Group.

About the Company
Rogers is a diversified public Canadian
communications and media company. We are Canada’s largest provider of
wireless voice and data communications services and one of Canada’s
leading providers of cable television, high-speed Internet and telephony
services. Through Rogers Media we are engaged in radio and television
broadcasting, televised shopping, magazines and trade publications, and
sports entertainment. We are publicly traded on the Toronto Stock
Exchange (TSX: RCI.A and RCI.B) and on the New York Stock Exchange
(NYSE: RCI).