Jul 30, 2008
The french market for mobile telephony
The french market for mobile telephony is not quite competitive because of the difficulties of virtual operators (MNVO) to successfully carve out the face of the incumbents, said the Competition Council in a non-binding opinion reported Wednesday. It proposes to "unlock" the contractual constraints affecting the virtual operators. The Minister of Economy Christine Lagarde and Secretary of State for Consumer Luc Chatel responded by inviting Arcep (Regulatory Authority of electronic communications et des Postes) to "take all necessary initiatives for development of operators mobile virtual ", based on the recommendations of the Competition Council. Independent administrative authority, the Council may be referred to requests for advice on any issue of competition. The Ministry of Economy asked him last May to focus on the mobile telephony market in France, dominated by the three incumbents, Orange, SFR and Bouygues Telecom. Since 2004-2005, virtual operators (MVNOs) have appeared on the market. The MNVO do not own networks but can still build mobile offerings for the retail market, buying the services necessary to one of three incumbents, known as "network". The MVNO market their brand and manage their subscriptions. But according to the Competition Council, most of these virtual operators have obtained housing conditions "not very favourable to the development of their activity". The result, today there is no "real dynamics of competition for the benefit of the market and consumers." The MNVO, "the Competition Council, France familiar to a rate of development" surprisingly weak "compared to other European countries: their market share in France is less than 5%, against nearly 25% in Germany and 15% in the UK and the Netherlands. With regard to turnover, accounting for 2.4% of the total generated. Bids MVNO "contrary to those of network operators" are indeed focused on prepaid cards and packages of short duration, where the average revenue per user are relatively low, "the Council. Ultimately, virtual operators "do not compete head on the heart of the bid of the three network operators, made up of packages with a 12 or 24 months to call an unlimited numbers." The Council calls for "new competitive incentives," including "a significant reduction in the duration of contracts and exclusivity clauses" preventing MVNO to renegotiate their contracts and to play competition. It is also conducive to the allocation of a fourth licence if it is accompanied by a "unlock technical conditions, tariff and contractual." The Competition Council considers that the legislation "can not be ruled out" in case of market failure or regulator (Arcep) to create incentives searched for "animate real competition". It is recommended that virtual operators have "access to network elements authorizing a real differentiation tender" and can negotiate rates for decoupled "to compete with offers retail network operators." The Ministry of Economy has responded by inviting Arcep to "take all necessary initiatives for the development of mobile virtual operators, based on the recommendations of the Competition Council." Mobile telephony, says Bercy in a press release, is now "for each French expenditure budget important - an average of 55 euros per household in 2007 - and little compressible." The competition in mobile telephony "is an" important issue for purchasing power.by erectusplus at 8:35 AM |
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