Update on the telecommunications market in Poland, the EU's
sixth largest economy - Part 2
Recent major Polish regulatory
announcements
Court rejects Polkomtel appeal against award of frequencies
to T-Mobile and P4
In September 2016 an administrative
court in Warsaw dismissed an appeal by Polkomtel against decisions by the UKE
regulator over the award of frequencies in the band 1800 MHz to the operators
P4 and T-Mobile Poland in the 2013 tender.
Europe challenges Polish regulator over 800 MHz allocation
In late September 2016 the European
Commission queried UKE's allocation of 800 MHz LTE spectrum in 2016 to the
fixed-wireless provider and MVNO Sferia, which it pointed out belonged to the
same group of companies as cellular operators Polkomtel and Aero2, and pay-TV
firm Cyfrowy Polsat.
Poland to achieve 42% broadband coverage in 2017
In early December 2016, UKE
published its work-plan for 2017 which included increasing broadband coverage
to 42% by the end of 2017, completing international negotiations on the
liberalisation of 700 MHz spectrum and a review of six markets subject to ex
ante regulation.
UKE starts process to invalidate 2007 auction of 1800 MHz
spectrum
On January 26, 2017 UKE announced
that it had started a process to invalidate the results of an auction of
frequencies in the 1800 MHz band carried out in 2007. This is a complicated
situation; in October 2007 CenterNet bid PLN128 million for frequencies in the
1710-1730 MHz band, but declined the paired band between 1805 and 1825 MHz.
This was later won in a separate tender process by Tolpis, a joint venture
between Italian ISP Eutalia and Telekomunikacja Kolejowa, which agreed to pay
PLN102 million. The start-up subsequently took on the name Mobyland before
being bought by another domestic new entrant, Aero2.
On March 1st it was announced that
both CenterNet and Aero2, owned by a company called Midas, would become part of
the Cyfrowy Polsat group, which also includes mobile network operator
Polkomtel. In August 2009 Mobyland and CenterNet had signed a letter of intent
to share usage of their 1700/1800 MHz spectrum for rolling out LTE services,
going on to launch Poland's first 4G service in September 2010.
At the time of the auction, the
outcome was disputed in court by second-placed bidder T-Mobile Poland (then
PTC). In July 2009 the Warsaw Administrative Court ruled that the participants
in the original October 2007 tender were not treated equally and that the
result should be annulled. UKE launched a successful appeal, but T-Mobile
continued its legal battle.
According to Polish newsite
Telko.in, while UKE now appears to be ready to cancel the auction result, the
regulator is unlikely to force Aero2/CenterNet to hand back its spectrum or
shut down its LTE network but will probably negotiate with all parties involved
to settle this and other separate disputes, including the result of the 2015
tender for 800/2600 MHz 4G spectrum auction, the result of which has also
caused some controversy.
UKE deactivates another 12 million unregistered prepaid SIMs
In early February UKE announced
that following the expiration of the February 2nd deadline for registration of
mobile SIMs, it had deactivated about 12 million unregistered prepaid ones.
Telecom Paper, an authoritative news source, suggested that although the
deactivated SIMs nominally accounted for 31.3% of all issued cards it is
possible the effect on the official mobile subscriptions numbers base might be
quite small as Polish operators are believed to typically report only the
number of their active users to UKE. Previously, T-Mobile in the third quarter
of 2015 deactivated 3.84 million unused accounts.
UKE ends mobile operator obligations related to wholesale
market for SMS termination
On February 2nd UKE announced that
following approvals by the European Commission and Poland's anti-monopoly
authority UOKiK (Urząd Ochrony Konkurencji i Konsumentów) of its proposals to
end the regulatory obligations of 2010 imposed on mobile operators on the
wholesale market for SMS termination. it had decided that no further regulation
was justified, and the obligations would cease to apply after a 90-day
transitional period.
Regulator reports weak response to offer of free 1 MHz
channels
On February 20th UKE reported weak
response to its offer of free 1 MHz simplex channels in the range 5.875 - 5.925
GHz in five locations of Poland's most northerly province of Pomerania. Only
one application was submitted for one location and no applications were
submitted for four locations.
Parliament makes Ministry of Digital Affairs responsible for
personal data registers
In late February the Polish
parliament introduced a law which made the country's Ministry of Digital
Affairs responsible for overseeing Poland's key personal data registers due to
the perception by the country's ruling Law and Justice Party of increased threats
for national IT systems and the lack of an entity to coordinate personal data
protection at government levels.
UKE outlines possible 5 year -plan including deregulation of
broadband access market
On February 27th UKE announced that
it had started a consultation on what should be included in the regulator's
five year plan, and on March 7th the new UKE president, Marcin Cichy, appointed
in September 2016, made the following interim comments:
·
Following the focused
deregulation in 2014 of the broadband access market in 76 out of 3,000
communes, in which UKE had assessed true deregulated competition was possible,
full deregulation of that market was being considered and would take place before
2021.
·
Spectrum distribution
and refarming also being looked at.
·
On that issue, Cichy
confirmed that 700 MHz frequencies were unlikely to be auctioned before 2020.
·
There was no plan to
increase taxation on telecommunications.
Orange Polska withdraws application to extend its CDMA
licence
Early in March 2017 Orange Polska
announced that, due to what it considered an excessive price of PLN 115 million
being asked for by the regulator, it had withdrawn its application to extend
for another 15 years its licence to provide around 27,000 Polish customers with
a communications service based on 450 MHz CDMA technology.
The licence had expired in 2015 but
had been continued under a temporary agreement with UKE. Following the Orange
announcement UKE said it would probably redistribute those frequencies via a
tender. Subsequently, Orange said it might consider competing in that tender (the
frequencies would have to be freed up for the tender to take place so Orange
presumably might find it difficult to use these frequencies for the original
fixed wireless service, although there is a chance UKE might now negotiate a
lower extension price with Orange).
Polish Ministry says operators offering TV services must
register subscribers
On March 9th the Polish Ministry of
Culture announced new regulations requiring operators of cable networks,
digital TV platforms, broadcasting services via xDSL and IPTV services to
report subscribers for registration with the Ministry within a week of the
signing of the contract. Operators will be compensated with a payment per
subscription reported but will also be fined if they fail to meet the
requirement.
Update on the telecommunications market in Poland, the EU's sixth largest economy - Part 1
Update on the telecommunications market in Poland, the EU's sixth largest economy - Part 1
