Sweden’s National Post and Telecom Agency (PTS) has launched a secondary consultation on its third generation of competitive decisions for ex-ante regulation of four telecoms sub-markets applying to mobile and fixed call interconnection and fixed telephony access. The regulatory determinations on the sub-markets for fixed access, fixed call origination, fixed call termination and mobile call termination will be aimed at ensuring that end-users can ‘continue to select fixed line rental from multiple operators and be able to call each other no matter which operator you have subscribed to,’ the watchdog stated. Market participants have until 31 August 2012 to comment on the PTS’ proposed market determinations/remedies, and the regulator expects to enter into consultations with the European Commission and other European regulatory authorities by early November. The final decisions are expected to be taken at the beginning of 2013.
As part of its current phase of market analysis, earlier this month the PTS released its proposed mobile termination rate (MTR) of SEK0.15 (USD0.021) per minute, representing a decrease from the current SEK0.21 MTR, with the new rate set to be applicable from 1 July 2012 (applicable retroactively). The figure resulted from using an updated calculation method based on the so-called hybrid model used to determine cost-oriented rates in mobile networks.