\tThe Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA) opened a consultation seeking views on how to boost competition in the nation’s mobile market, after a review pointed to barriers involving broadband services.<\/p>\n
In a call for comments, the regulator said it had discovered evidence relating to market share and retail pricing which pointed to a lack of competition in several areas. ICASA highlighted considerable barriers to entering retail markets because wholesale services were not supplied competitively.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe market for site access in particular is highly concentrated in many municipalities, full-coverage roaming services are only offered by two operators, and only one operator offers MVNO services\u201d, the authority noted.<\/p>\n
\u201cVodacom is dominant in 104 municipalities by itself, MTN is dominant in 18 by itself, and MTN and Vodacom are both dominant in two municipalities\u201d, it said.<\/p>\n
To address site access concerns, the regulator suggested more detailed guidelines and redrafting of leasing regulations, including a requirement to publish site information online, a time limit for responding to access requests, and regulating when site sharing should be considered technically and economically feasible.<\/p>\n
ICASA said this would \u201cpreclude the indefinite reserving of space on masts for the incumbent\u2019s equipment” and enable smaller operators to deploy infrastructure more quickly.<\/p>\n
In the roaming market the authority found only MTN and Vodacom to have substantial coverage in many municipalities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA) opened a consultation seeking views on how …<\/p>\n
The post South Africa regulator takes on competition concerns<\/a> appeared first on Mobile World Live<\/a>.<\/p>\n