Candidates for European Union (EU) membership are starting the re...
Candidates for European Union (EU) membership are starting the required process of integrating with the European internal market, a report released Tues. by the European Commission (EC) found. The survey by IBM Business Consulting Services is the 4th in…
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a series tracking development of the telecom services markets in the 13 candidate countries -- Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia and Turkey. Findings include: (1) Retail price data show substantial differences between countries in the degree of rebalancing that has happened so far. (2) Wholesale prices, as reflected in interconnection charges, vary from close alignment with the EU market to a complete absence of published figures. In some countries, retail and wholesale prices are close enough together to hamper market entry. (3) In 7 countries the state continues to hold a controlling stake in the incumbent telco. (4) Most candidate countries have little or no competition in the area of local access. (5) Mobile services continue to represent a rising share of the whole market, with revenue topping the share of fixed voice services in 8 candidate nations. The major growth drivers are the Internet and the mobile sector. (6) The slow pace of price rebalancing is shown by the relatively low monthly rental fees. Costs for national fixed calls are lower than, but comparable with, prices in EU member states, but prices for international calls vary widely and in some countries are much higher than in member states. (7) All candidate countries have established national regulatory authorities. (8) Fixed-to-fixed interconnection is operational in 10 countries and the charges for terminating fixed and mobile calls are equal. The price for fixed-to- mobile interconnection is less variable and slightly below that in the EU. (9) The share of broadband access via ADSL or CaTV networks is rising rapidly but narrowband access predominates. Assessed prices for dial-up Internet connections vary greatly between individual countries. The report aims to help regulators, policymakers, consumers, service providers, investors and others interested in the state of the telecom markets in EU accession countries, the EC said.