The Hungarian Communications Market Developments and ...

16 17
Decision
Round 1
Year
Round 2
Year
2005 2006 2007 2008 2006 2007 2008
Total
Reference interconnection offers (RIO) - 5 5* 1* - - 5 16
Reference unbundling offers (RUO) - 5 5* - - - 6 16
Establishment of wholesale price "Retail minus” (RM) - 6+3* 14* - - - 5 28
Accounting separation - 5 8* 2 - - 2 17
Mobile termination rates 2 1+3* - - 3 - - 9
Prices of terrestrial broadcasting - - - 1 - - - 1
* modification decision
Mandated service providers may have recourse to remedies
against the decisions of NHH as provided by law. This is an option
service providers, in fact, resorted to several times over the past
years. They typically challenged those decisions of NHH that involved
the introduction of some kind of price control, in particular
if this meant an obligation of setting cost-based prices.
In connection with the first round of market analysis, thirteen
claims were submitted to the Budapest Metropolitan Court by service
providers with reference to seven decisions, to be followed by
ten claims against four decisions in the second round.
In all court proceedings completed so far, the court decided in
favour of NHH. The majority of such proceedings ended with the final
decision by the Budapest Metropolitan Court, and the Supreme Court
made a final judgement in favour of NHH in the case of the mobile termination
market. Currently, there are two proceedings underway: one
at the Court of Appeal, as the Budapest Metropolitan Court rejected
the claim of the defendants (Market 16, second round decision) and
another one at the Budapest Metropolitan Court (Market 18).
2.3 Frequency management
Frequency management is a duty performed in order to ensure the
operating conditions of the different civil terrestrial, over-the-air,
satellite, fixed-location and mobile radio services in Hungary as
well as to guarantee undisturbed spectrum usage and environment.
This concurrently involves regulatory, market surveillance, licensing,
record keeping and planning activities. The basic tasks and rules
as regards frequency management are laid down in Eht., and its
associated regulations and the decisions of the European Union. The
Authority performs this work in harmony with the decisions and recommendations
of international organisations of radiocommunication,
in particular the International Telecommunication Union’s Radiocommunication
Sector (ITU-R) and the Electronic Communications
Committee of the European Conference of Postal and Telecommunications
Administrations (CEPT/ECC).
The task of frequency management incorporates the following
main activities:
• licensing
• control
• record keeping
• information provision
• frequency planning
• frequency coordination
• determination of frequency fees
• development and continuous maintenance of the rules for frequency
usage
• monitoring of technological development, preparation of forecasts
for future use of bands
• participation in the legislative process of preparing legal regulations
• participation in the work of international organisations.
Administrative duties related to frequency management
The number of licensing cases (procedures, decisions) was between
8 and 14 thousand per year in the period between 2004 and 2008.
As regards radiocommunication, international frequency coordination
with neighbouring countries resulted in a series of bilateral and
multilateral agreements for 400 MHz, 1800 MHz, 3.5, 26 and 28 GHz
bands. The Authority carried out a review of government allocations
previously coordinated in the frequency band of the Uniform Digital
Radiocommunication System (EDR), investigated the agreement of
preferred allocation and coordinated assignments in the 400 MHz
bands, updated the annexes of service providers’ agreements, and
provided information to domestic end users. With an increase from
6,433 in 2004 to 12,521 in 2007, the number of coordination tasks
almost doubled to surpass 12,000 already in the first half of 2008.
A significant growth is apparent also in market surveillance activities
as regards radiocommunication, particularly in the field of freeto-air
broadcasting. Duties concerning free-to-air broadcasting also
assume a significant role within coordination activities, primarily due
to the introduction of digital free-to-air broadcasting.