With the roll out of 3G services by the middle of next year expect some anti-competitive measures by the existing players putting new operators at a disadvantage. This would arise because the department of telecommunications (DoT) has not made mandatory roaming between 3G and 2G networks while laying down the final guidelines. ?We have left roaming between 3G and 2G networks on market forces,? a DoT official told FE.
The problem which would thus arise is that 3G subscribers of, especially new or regional operators, who do not have 2G networks, would face problems in roaming. However, pan-India 2G players, who have 3G networks even in some circles would have an advantage and their subscribers would not face any such problem.
Visualise a scenario: A new, foreign telecom operator bids for 3G spectrum and wins in 10 circles. However, it would not be able to roll out services in all the 10 circles at one go and would do so in a phased manner. If it is able to roll out 3G services in Delhi and not in Mumbai, its subscribers would be at the mercy of the 2G players for roaming. If the 2G operator refuses roaming it would make business case for the new 3G operator very difficult.
Quite in contrast, a 2G operator who also wins bids in similar circles for 3G and goes for a phased roll out can provide roaming to its subscribers on its 2G network where its 3G services are yet to come. In this manner existing players can block competition from newer players.
Operators are quite surprised as to why DoT has not made 3G and 2G roaming mandatory as earlier a DoT committee had suggested that such roaming should be made mandatory.
In fact, some of the operators told FE that they are planning to raise the issue at the pre-bid conference DoT is going to have on December 23. The auctions are planned for January 15, 2009.
Denying roaming access is one of the tools, which has been used by existing players to block competition. For instance, the state-owned Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL), which has the most extensive 2G network does not provide roaming on its network to any other operator barring another state-owned operator, MTNL. Only recently it has entered into an intra-cirlce roaming pact with a new operator, Swan Telecom.
Similarly, CDMA mobile operators do not have roaming pacts with one another, which puts Tata Teleservices Ltd (TTSL) at a disadvantage as it does not have services in all the 23 circles.
In a slightly different case, GSM operators like Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Essar and Idea Cellular sometime back refused interconnection to Reliance Communications Ltd?s (Rcomm) forthcoming GSM services. The matter was finally resolved with the intervention of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai).
