Communications Regulatory Authority

2005 with Resolution no. 117/05/CONS, by which AGCOM’s position was submitted
to a national public consultation with regard to the wholesale market for broadband
access. After carrying out the public consultation, on 29 September 2005 AGCOM had
adopted a draft regulation which was submitted to the Antitrust Authority – under
article 19 of the Code and pursuant to the joint-work agreement entered into with the
Antitrust Authority – and also notified to the European Commission and to Member
States regulatory authorities, under article 12, paragraph 3 of the Code of Electronic
Communications.
Having regard to the substantial agreement of opinions expressed by the
Antitrust Authority and by the European Commission, in its final regulation, while
confirming the previous provisions, AGCOM identified a nationwide market which
includes wholesale connectivity services offered by different technologic platforms,
such as xDSL, fibre optics and satellite. AGCOM also confirmed Telecom Italia as an
undertaking with a significant market power, and maintained the imposition of network
access, transparency, non-discrimination, price control and cost accounting regulatory
obligations (as previously identified).
In the context of this regulation AGCOM deemed it appropriate to specify,
though, that in the period between its coming into force and the approval of the
reference offer for bitstream services, Telecom Italia is still required to disclose the
technical (including SLAs) and price terms and conditions of each new retail and
wholesale offer of broadband services, with at least 90 days’ notice before their roll-out
(a 30 days’ notice is required if the new offer differs from the previous ones only in
price terms). This requirement, on which verification of the minus correctness is based,
if applied to wholesale offers would discourage Telecom Italia’s adopting exclusive
policies during the transition phase from the cost-recovery system based on the retail
minus to the one based on cost-orientation under the above regulation.
In order to implement article 14 of Resolution no. 34/06/CONS, on 3 April
2006, with decision no. 11/06/SG, AGCOM started off the work of the bitstream service
implementation panel of experts in charge of clarifying and explaining all technical,
pricing and accounting aspects which are a prerequisite to service implementation.
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