The European Commission launched a consultation on Thursday on the evolution of the telecoms sector and the issue of infrastructure financing.
The European Commissioner for Industry, Thierry Breton, called on Monday for a debate without “taboo» on the question of the financing by the Internet giants of telecom infrastructures in Europe, ensuring that he does not personally take sides on this delicate subject.
The debate launched by the European Commission on this issue is “very open, there are no taboos“Assured Thierry Breton to journalists during a trip to the Mobile World Fair (MWC), which opened Monday for four days in Barcelona. “I know some will voice their concerns“but the debate”is open to everyone“added the commissioner, saying he wanted a”new approach” and no “a binary choice between those who provide the network and those who feed it traffic“.
Read alsoBrussels launches the battle for the financing of telecom networks by the internet giants
The European Commission on Thursday launched a three-month consultation on the evolution of the telecoms sector and the ways of financing the costly infrastructures necessary to adapt to the exponential demand for data. Internet giants such as Google, Apple, Meta and Netflix are potentially targeted, as they monopolize an ever-increasing share of bandwidth, while European telecommunications operators complain of a lack of resources to finance this equipment.
Monday morning, the boss of Orange, Christel Heydemann, thus assured that the situation was no longer “tenable,” citing a PwC study that “46% of telecom CEOs think their company won’t live another decadein the face of the massive cost of this equipment. “It is not a question of whether one particular interest should prevail over another.“, but to see how “realizing the great leap forward in connectivity that awaits us“, underlined for his part Thierry Breton.