ISLAMABAD: Arguing before the Competition Commission of Pakistan (CCP) on Tuesday against the proposed acquisition of Telenor Pakistan (Pvt) Ltd and Orion Towers (Pvt) Ltd by PTCL, Zong claimed the move would hit market competition.

Zong representatives claimed that Pakistan Telecommunication Company Ltd’s market share would rise to 36.50pc if the commission approves this acquisition.

The merger, in its second phase of the review, was of concern to the representatives of Zong as they maintained that the unified company will become a very large entity. They argued that it would have the controlling capacity over the upstream as well as the wholesale and retail business in the telecom sector.

The bench comprised CCP Chairman Dr Kabir Ahmed Sidhu, and members Salman Amin and Abdul Rashid Sheikh.

Pleading the case, Zong representatives provided an in-depth review focusing on potential market power concentration, competitive dynamics and broader impact on the telecommunications sector after the takeover.

Currently, Jazz leads as the top telecom operator in the country with almost 37pc market share, and after the merger of Telenor with the Ufone, the company’s market share will be around 36.50pc the of total.

However, Zong will be left with only 25.6pc of the total telecom market share, which will create an uncompetitive competition environment.

Pakistan Telecommunication Auth­ority’s Director-General (Wireless — Licensing) Amer Shahzad was also present at the hearing.

The key concern raised during the hearing was spectrum allocation as it was a scarce resource and a critical determinant of market power for the mobile operators with each frequency band offering distinct efficiency and coverage attributes.

The government officials informed the bench that post-transaction, the joint Ufone-Telenor company would be in control of 34.4pc of the total allocated spectrum in the retail mobile telecommunications market.

Published in Dawn, October 23th, 2024