EU calls for expansion of telecoms rules into broadband
The European Commission has unveiled plans that would force telecommunications providers to share broadband infrastructure with rivals and extend regulation in the sector to new areas such as text messaging.
Viviane Reding, European Union commissioner in charge of the EU’s telecommunications policy said the plans would encourage more competition in the sector.
“We must open the markets when they are dominated by dominant players,” she said in Brussels.
“We have seen in all our analysis, where the markets are opened, investments are done and prices go down for consumers.”
Big industry players however, are against the expansion of EU rules in the field, while smaller operators want stronger rules to allow them better access to the market.
Reding has in the past complained that operators such as Deutsche Telekom AG and France Telecom control 80 per cent of European broadband connections, as compared to US telephone companies which account for only 38% of subscribers there.
