Annual Report 2008 - TRA - Telecommunication Regulatory Authority

22 TRA Annual Report 2008 Building a Competitive Market
The call termination rates - the fee Batelco charges to other operators for delivering calls from their networks to
Batelco customers - were reduced by 5 per cent over fixed networks and 14 per cent over mobile networks.
Before the new Offer came into effect, TRA invited all licensed operators to a meeting in order to discuss the Offer
and its newly approved charges.
Dominance in mobile termination services
A significant part of the final cost a customer pays for a call derives from the wholesale tariff that one operator
charges another for delivering the call to a customer on its network - the termination service. On mobile networks
this covers voice calls, Short Messaging Services (SMS) and Multimedia Messaging Services (MMS). On 26 November
TRA issued a draft regulation declaring both Batelco and Zain dominant in the mobile termination market. The
effect of this is that both Zain and Batelco’s termination rates would be regulated.
While Batelco’s termination rates had been regulated since 2003 and have decreased, Zain’s have not been regulated
and are subject only to commercial agreements. With the expected entry into the market of a third operator and
Zain gaining considerable market share, TRA considered that the two established operators should now be treated
similarly. The move would provide added certainty for existing licensed operators as well as for the third mobile
operator. The consultation was ongoing at the end of the year.
Telecommunications infrastructure
One of the key requirements for fair and sustainable competition in the telecommunications market is effective
access to public and private properties in order to deploy telecommunications infrastructure. Since the liberalisation
of fixed line services in 2004, new market entrants had faced obstacles in installing alternative cable networks on
the ground.
New properties
In January TRA began a project to identify and develop an appropriate regulatory policy for deploying networks
in new property developments. These could be buildings, compounds or industrial parks – for example in the
Islands. TRA’s objectives were to analyse the problems that operators had encountered and to look for models for
delivering state-of-the-art telecommunications infrastructure and services to the people who live and work in these
developments while at the same time safeguarding consumer choice.
More than 60 people, comprising property developers, investors and telecommunications operators, attended a
meeting held by TRA on this issue in June. The purpose was to present views on the appropriate and effective
regulatory approach that would achieve TRA’s aims and facilitate investment.
TRA hosts a meeting on telecommunications infrastructure in new properties developments