Rogers, Bell, Telus, Telesat and several smaller providers will back each other up if any of them suffers a network failure that puts Canadians’ lives, health or safety at risk. The deal allows them to use each other’s networks to serve their customers’ 911 calls and deliver wireless roaming and to draw on each other’s workers, equipment, vehicles and buildings if needed—subject to paying an eventual bill for the help. (The Logic)

Talking point: Innovation Minister François-Philippe Champagne announced the memorandum of understanding—he ordered them to make an agreement within 60 days after a buggy update took down Rogers services on July 8. Champagne said he shouldn’t have been the one attempting to reach Rogers CEO Tony Staffieri during the outage; the agreement requires that the parties tell the government and the public what’s happening during a major outage and deliver a full report within 30 days.