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Bundesnetzagentur acknowledges European Commission’s competition concerns, but still aims to move forward on establishing rules for vectoring rollout.
Germany’s telecoms regulator has reworked its plan to allow Deutsche Telekom to use vectoring technology to boost network speeds in a bid to address competition concerns from the European Commission.
Bundesnetzagentur on Thursday acknowledged the Commission’s objections to the plan, which centre on the need to safeguard competition, and said it will present an amended version of its draft decision on the subject next week.
The national regulator allowed Deutsche Telekom to push ahead with vectoring and sent a draft proposal on the subject to the European Commission in April. The following month the Commission launched an in-depth investigation into the proposal.
"Our aim is to allow both a network upgrade and high quality access for competitors," digital economy commissioner Günther Oettinger said at the time.
"For this, we need sufficient safeguards to protect sustainable competition and create incentives to invest in future-oriented networks for the gigabit society, a society where citizens and businesses benefit from ultra-fast connectivity (1000 Mbps)," he said.
Despite efforts to make virtual unbundling offers available to rival players, Deutsche Telekom competitors have complained about the vectoring plan.
Vodafone has been particularly vocal, hitting out at the regulator for supporting what it believes is a short-term stopgap technology, rather than pushing for investment in fibre.
The regulator is undeterred though.
In a statement on Thursday, Bundesnetzagentur president Jochen Homann said he hopes the regulator’s new plans will dispel the Commission’s concerns about the competitive aspect of vectoring, enabling it to move ahead with determining the rules for the use of the technology.
