The Irish regulatory authority ComReg has published two documents relating to mobile call termination.
a) The first document (04/62a) contains ComReg’s conclusions following the national consultation, and the notification that ComReg is making to the European Commission, in application of Art. 7 of the Framework Directive 2002/21/EC.
ComReg concludes that the relevant product market is “voice call termination on the individual network of each Mobile Network Operator“, and the geographical market is the territory of the Republic of Ireland. Consequently, ComReg proposes to declare Vodafone, O2, Meteor and ‘3’ as having Significant Market Power.
ComReg also concludes that regulatory remedies of transparency, non-discrimination, and cost-orientation should be applied. ComReg expresses its belief that, in support of those remedies, it may be appropriate to impose additional remedies of accounting separation and cost accounting.
b) The second document (04/62b) is a public consultation on a number of options for the detailed implementation of the proposed remedies, including a number of ways to reduce wholesale voice call termination charges to what ComReg describes as “efficient operator levels”, and taking into account certain voluntary commitments put forward by some of the mobile operators.
The deadline for responses to the ComReg consultation is 20 July 2004.
The full text of documents 04/62a and 04/62b can be accessed by clicking on the document numbers highlighted in this T-REGS news item.