The results of Telstra and TPG’s intense lobbying to lock down a proposed network sharing deal that would cover 17 per cent of the country will be handed down next week, just three days from Christmas.
Optus has fought equally as hard against the 10-year regional “Multi-Operator Core Network” (MOCN) agreement, which it says is anti-competitive, and could risk lives during emergencies.
The proposed deal would see TPG decommission over 700 mobile sites and deliver its traffic to Telstra’s network, with Telstra gaining all of TPG’s under-utilised regional spectrum.
This will immediately bump TPG’s national coverage to 98.6 per cent of homes, allowing them to compete with Optus and Telstra in the bush.
For Telstra, any regional customers lost to TPG will be more than offset by the revenue it will receive from the deal.
Optus says the deal will result in regional customers being worse off. It says fewer towers will stunt emergency response, and that such a deal will give Telstra an unbeatable lead in the race to secure 5G coverage.
“This arrangement would massively entrench and extend the dominant market position of Telstra, which already has 70 per cent share in regional mobile services,” Optus Vice President Regulatory and Public Affairs, Andrew Sheridan, says.
“And that would undermine the commercial viability of additional investment in regional infrastructure by Optus or any other potential entrant.”
Telstra and TPG filed an updated proposal last month offering that, should their merger result in anti-competition issues within the first eight years, the ACCC can kill.
In addition, TPG would retain approximately 60 percent of its total sites within the 17 percent regional coverage zone for the period, until the assessment period is over.
This would mean that, should the ACCC choose to unwind the deal, TPG could still compete.
This sweetener was met with distain from Optus.
“Telstra and TPG’s concessions don’t address the anti-competitive nature of the proposed arrangement and are simply designed to ‘kick the can down the road’,” Sheridan told Channel News after the new proposal was lodged.
“Either way, regional Australia will still be worse off.”
