ISLAMABAD, Sept 2: The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority on Thursday strictly prohibited the telecom operators enjoying the status of Significant Market Power (SMP) from reducing tariffs
and indulging in other practices prejudicial to the SMP status without prior approval of the authority.
The decision was taken by the PTA after seeking comments from various stakeholders and in line with the telecom deregulation policy to create a fair competitive environment and restrain dominant operators from abusing their position through anti-competitive practices.
The PTA said that these measures and steps were strictly in accordance with the deregulation policy issued by the government and aimed at checking anti-competitive practices from major players against incoming smaller players.
The PTA in an announcement explained that the SMP status was given to a telecom operator when an operator had a share of more than 25 per cent of particular telecom market on the basis of sectoral revenues.
The status is accorded after taking into account the operator's ability to influence market conditions, its turnover relative to size of market, control of the means of access to customers, access to financial resources and experience in providing telecommunication services and products in the respective market.
The status of an operator is determined by the authority after identification of the market both in terms of geographical and market/products aspects, measuring the size of market and collecting data on the economic activities of the organizations operating in the market.
The PTA has accorded the status of SMP to Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL), Special Communication Organization (SCO) and Pakistan Mobile Communications Limited (PMCL-Mobilink).
The SMP status has been awarded to PTCL for Local Loop (LL) fixed line telecommunication services in 14 telecom regions and Long Distance International (LDI) fixed line telecommunication services all over the country.
For leased line and national interconnection, PTCL has also been awarded the status of SMP. SCO has been given the status of SMP for LL and LDI fixed line and mobile cellular services in AJK and Northern Areas.
Similarly, PMCL (Mobilink) has been awarded the status of SMP for mobile cellular telecommunication service and national interconnection for the whole country. Operators enjoying the status of SMP have to fulfil certain obligations, including tariff regulation, publication of reference interconnect offer (RIO), carrier pre-selection, accounting separation and unbundling of services.
