Softbank BB, a Japanese competitive telecom service provider, urg...
Softbank BB, a Japanese competitive telecom service provider, urged the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) to ensure that Japanese telecom markets are open to competition. It expressed concern that the Japanese Ministry of Internal Affairs was “frequently reluctant to open…
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telecommunications markets to new competition or to institute a system of independent, fair and transparent regulation.” Specifically, Softbank asked the USTR to: (1) Ensure a fair and non- discriminatory process for allocating mobile service spectrum in line with the WTO General Agreement in Trade in Services and the Reference Paper. (2) Press the Japanese govt. to adopt “a pro-competitive policy of favoring qualified new entrants when awarding mobile radio licenses.” (3) Urge the Japanese govt. to resist incumbent “NTT’s efforts to backtrack on its obligations to unbundle network elements and permit line sharing on reasonable terms.” (4) Urge the govt. to “hold NTT, as the entrenched facilities monopolist, to its fair operation of co-location and rights of way and to press NTT to open its customer data on reasonable terms.” Softbank’s comments came in response to the USTR’s annual Sec. 1377 review of the operation and effectiveness of all U.S. telecom trade agreements (CD Dec 27 p4).