Iran looks to telecoms sector reform

The government of Iran has laid down a series of reform targets for the telecoms sector under its latest five-year plan for 2016-2021. According to a report from the Financial Tribune, authorities want internet bandwidth increased to 30TB by March 2021, with school networks and e-government services digitised. The Ministry of ICT is also being urged to attract further private sector collaboration and foreign investment to the telecoms industry. In addition, the government is calling for structural reform at state-owned firm Telecommunications Infrastructure Company of Iran (TIC), which operates fixed line networks which are leased to third-party telcos and ISPs. TIC is to be split into three separate entities: the International Data Transit Company, Research & Development Company and Infrastructure Development Company.