Speaking at ZF Digital’ 14 organized by Ziarul Financiar, Orange Romania CEO Jean-Francois Fallacher said Malta and Romania are the only EU member states that have not regulated mobile operators’ access to fixed telecommunication networks.
He also said that mobile telephony operators were required, during the auction organized in 2012 for the awarding of mobile telephony licenses, to provide national roaming to the other operators. In Romania, he went on, one of the players has a market share of over 50% and is not at all regulated, therefore, it is very difficult to access that market.
Vodafone Romania CEO Ravinder Takkar agreed with Fallacher’s adding that mobile operators provide access to the other telecom operators but they, in turn, do not have access, under the same conditions, to fixed networks. Takkar pointed out that mobile operators are not requesting certain tariffs, but only regulated access to fixed networks, the way the access to mobile networks is regulated.
Nikolai Beckers, Chief Executive Officer of Telekom Romania Communications and Telekom Romania Mobile Communications, which operates on the local market under the brand Telekom Romania, said he backs the idea of regulating mobile telephony operators’ access to fixed networks.
Beckers added that Telekom Romania paid EUR14 million in pole utility tax, which is nearly 40% of the overall amount paid by all operators.