Other firms to get access to Cablelink

OTHER telecommunications users are to get access to Cablelink, the Dublin cable system, as a vehicle to sell their services. In a press release formally announcing its approval for the strategic alliance between Telecom and two Continental EU telecom companies, the EU Commission said access to Cablelink would be given on a non discriminatory basis. The agreement was signed yesterday. Telecom Eireann owns 75 per cent of Cablelink.

Telecom Eireann has indicated for some time its intention to allow other providers of service to have access to Cablelink. As well as providing telephony services, cable is also developing in many countries as a platform to provide a whole range of multimedia services such as pay per view television, advanced video services and home entertainment. In the future it may also become a vehicle to provide services such as home banking or shopping.

Some of Telecom's competitors have called for it to be forced to sell the 75 per cent stake to open up the industry to more competition and this view was supported in a recent report by Forfas. The EU Commission may also examine the issue again as part of an ongoing study it is making of the cable industry across Europe.

On the strategic alliance between Telecom Eireann and Comsource, a consortium of KPN of the Netherlands and Telia of Sweden, the Commission said that Ireland's plans to liberalise its telecoms market meant Telecom Eireann would not strengthen its current market position.

As neither KPN or Telia is involved in the Irish market, the Commission said there is no issue relating to market share and approved the purchase by Comsource of an initial 20 per cent of Telecom.

The Commission said telecommunications competition was already increasing in many sectors, with 38 licensed providers already offering value added telecoms services in Ireland and that a second GSM operator was due to start to operate soon.

The European Commission also said it was ready to clear the Uniworld telecommunications alliance between US phone giant AT&T and Europe's Unisource joint venture. This is important for Telecom as KPN and Telia are both members of Unisource and their link to AT&T would give Telecom access to one of the big global networks.

It said it was also ready to clear the involvement of Spain's Telefonica in Unisouce, which as well as KPN and Telia also involves Swiss Telecom.

The Commission said it would dive interested parties one month to comment before taking final decisions.

In the Uniworld/Unisource deals, the EU executive noted that both Spain and Switzerland had also agreed to liberalise their telecoms markets and that AT&T had agreed to several conditions to win approval of the deals.

The US company agreed to advise the Commission promptly of any complaint filed with the US Federal Communications Commission about access to its international facilities and of the FCC's decision.

It also agreed that its "accounting rates", charges for completing foreign phone calls, for other companies would be no higher than the lowest rate offered to any Unisource shareholder, the Commission said.