On July 26 2011 Brazil's telecommunications regulator (ANATEL) submitted its proposed General Plan of Competition Goals for public consultation. The purpose of the plan is to govern competition between the different providers, both in the markets where balanced competition has already been established and in those where a few groups dominate service offerings.
ANATEL intends to define the new criteria to identify the strongest economic groups (ie, those with significant market power) to establish obligations related to the opening up of the market.
In non-competitive markets, measures will be proposed to encourage competition among the agents. In competitive markets, the intention is to remove obligations imposed on providers with significant market power.
The proposal determines two types of regulatory remedies - structural and distinct. The structural remedies are applied to all regulated service markets. They involve the creation of:
- wholesale databases for increasing transparency with sequential control of queues and of service conditions (eg, prices or terms);
- a conflict resolution summary proceeding for small providers (ie, those without significant market power) against large providers (ie, those with significant market power); and
- three further entities:
- a comparer entity for retail offerings, providing greater transparency for consumers;
- a representative entity for groups without significant market power, strengthening them in relation to the supervisor entity and those represented in conflict settlements; and
- a supervisor entity for wholesale offerings that centralises access to databases of groups with significant market power, carries out the private resolution of conflicts and evaluates the reference offerings of groups with significant market power.
The distinct remedies, in their turn, are specific for each market. Special mention is made to the requirement of groups with significant market power to present reference offerings of the wholesale products, according to the table below:
| Product | Obligatory reference offerings |
| Interconnection in landline telephone networks | Interconnection (Classes I, II and III) - TU-RL |
| Interconnection in mobile networks | Interconnection (Classes II, III and IV) - VU-M |
| Infrastructure and networks for access in landline networks | Full unbundling and bitstream |
| Ducts, conduits, posts and towers | |
| Infrastructure and networks for access in mobile networks | Ducts, conduits, posts and towers |
| Infrastructure and transport networks | Industrial Exploitation of Dedicated Lines (EILD) and the exploitation of backhaul |
| Ducts, conduits, posts and towers | |
| Interconnection (Class V) | |
| Pay television | Ducts, conduits, posts and towers |
Other determined measures include:
- the construction of a traffic exchange point (TEP) in each registration area in which the group operates. This measure will increase the number of TEPs from 16 to 67, bringing about a real reduction in the cost of providing broadband in Brazil;
- allowing pay television subscribers to contract their service via any decoder; and
- the construction of a transport network in Region III by Oi, in compliance with the General Grants Plan.
Comments and input should be sent on or before October 8 2011.
For further information on this topic please contact Ricardo Barretto Ferreira Da Silva, Fabio Ferreira Kujawski or Thays Castaldi Gentil at BARRETTO FERREIRA KUJAWSKI E BRANCHER – Sociedade de Advogados by telephone (+55 11 3897 0300), fax (+55 11 3897 0330) or email ([email protected], [email protected] or [email protected]).