The T-Mobile – Orange merger seems star crossed, as it always crosses one hurdle only to come upon another. The latest roadblock has cropped up in the form of a limit on broadcast spectrum that can be owned by a single provider.
New initiatives and upgrade operations are gaining priority in the Digital Britain initiative as part of a focussed approach towards pushing the UK forward in the global broadband arena. Alongside this, concerns are increasing about letting one provider get the lion’s share of broadcast spectrum.
Ever since the merger was announced, there have been doubts and fears voiced about this and similar risks. They arise from the fact that if the merger goes through, the new entity would be the largest mobile operator in the UK and would monopolize the broadband market.
Industry analysts have voiced concerns about the immense purchasing power the new company would wield. Existing players like Vodafone and O2 may have to shift their sights to less competitive markets, leaving the cream to the new entity.
In response to these fears, a move has been proposed to fix a limit on how much broadcast spectrum can be controlled by a single operator. This was revealed by a Guardian report, which outlined the government programme to establish 2Mb broadband in the country by the end of 2012.
Reallocation of broadband spectrum is already the subject of heavy discussion between network providers and government representatives. Spectrum allocation appears to have the green signal from the government in the preliminary work for the 2Mb super speed broadband scheme. Such regulation will necessitate selling of some broadband spectrum by T-Mobile and Orange.
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