Celebrations and commiserations
SOME OF THE value-added network service (Vans) licensees are celebrating the final stages of regulator Icasa’s process that will see their licences converted into electronic communications service (ECS) licences under the Electronic Communications Act (ECA). However, it’s only the Vans that don’t want to self-provide that are breaking out the bubbly.
For those that do seek that right – such as Internet Solutions and Vox Telecom – the continuation of the licensing process means only a glaring reminder that the incumbent operators will see their old licences converted into individual electronic communications network service (i-ECNS) licences.
And that means they’ll get more rights than before, enabling them to leap even further ahead of their potential new competitors than they’ve been able to do until now. And the longer the Altech Autopage court battle takes, the worse the situation can become for them. Its application has effectively delayed Icasa’s adjudication of all new i-ECNS licences.
The hearings are set down for 29 to 31 July, and the judge has promised a speedy resolution. But that could still take until early next year.
Under the legal microscope is whether or not all Vans have the right to self-provide. Altech Autopage says they should be entitled to do so. The Department of Communications and Icasa disagree. A number of other Vans are also opposing the application, on the grounds that Autopage should have challenged the issue sooner instead of holding up deregulation at the final hour.
Vox CEO Doug Reed says it’s immaterial to him whether the company has a Vans licence or an ECS. “This process has been going on for years and years,” he says. There’s clearly frustration and fatigue in his voice. As one of the Vans (soon to be ECS licensees) that wants to self-provide (ie, it wants an i-ECNS licence), it has opposed Autopage’s court application, and Vox is now looking ahead to the start of the hearings.
John Holdsworth, CEO of ECN, a Vans that has no intention of self-providing, says the process of converting its Vans licence into an ECS is “absolutely Christmas” for the company. That’s because the ECA gives the ECS licensees a host of rights and entitlements that they didn’t previously have.
Holdsworth says those include being able to lease capacity from operators other than Telkom. That could include Vodacom Business, MTN Network Solutions (which could soon incorporate Verizon), Neotel or any of the other i-ECNS licensees.
But perhaps most importantly the adjudication of the licences will mean Icasa can proceed with other important regulatory changes, such as the introduction of carrier pre-select and fixed line number portability. Holdsworth previously said he believed regulations such as those were the “real competitive enablers”.
For example, carrier pre-select would enable telephone subscribers to have their calls routed over a different network to that of the incumbent provider. Holdsworth said at the time: “Telkom will haemorrhage customers. It will bring down the cost to subscribers and break the stranglehold.”
He also touted the importance of introducing a cost-based regime for connecting calls from one operator to another. But while Holdsworth believes carrier pre-select and fixed line number portability could be introduced as early as this year, it could take much longer to introduce cost-based interconnect.
Holdsworth says although Icasa has first prioritised the licence conversion process it also has teams working on various other changes in the ECA that it must breathe life into through regulations. He says Icasa had indicated at a briefing nearly two months ago it did intend to go ahead with the licence conversion process in the June/July/August timeframe and it seems to be sticking to that. Icasa filed a notice of its intention to convert the licences of existing operators in a recent Government Gazette.
The Gazette contains the draft i-ECNS and ECS licences. But there’s very little detail contained in the licences. Holdsworth says Icasa had argued those were so-called “thin licences” because the licensee’s rights and obligations were contained in the ECA and didn’t need to be repeated in their licence documents.
The public has been given until 18 July to comment on the draft licences. Some of the Vans have also been asked by Icasa to submit certain outstanding information. Datapro (the old Vox) was among those. But Reed says the group had rolled its three Vans licences – under the names of Datapro, Orion and Vox – into one licence application and had submitted all the required information.
Finweek
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