Will Europe show FCC the way?
The European Commission today announced it’s plan to come up with a centralized regulatory framework for it’s telecommunications companies, with the goal of restructuring telecom companies by separating the Internet and telephone services into separate divisions.
“I have come to the conclusion that the instrument of functional separation should be added to the remedies tool box of national telecom regulators, to be available for the stubborn cases where other remedies have been tried, but have failed to deliver the desired regulatory outcome,” stated EU Commissioner for Information Society and Media Viviane Reding, in a speech last October 11.
While broadband penetration is fairly high in Europe, many of the bigger telecom companies dominate service because of their ability to bundle Internet services with landline or wireless phone service. The functional separation of the telecom companies would give a leg up to the so-called “alternative access providers”, who, while not offering bundled services, do offer Internet service at lower rates.
The proposal has met with fierce resistance, not only from the big telecom companies, but also from regulators in other member states, including France and Germany,
This should provide an interesting preview to how similar action by the FCC would be viewed within the US!