ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s telecom regulator has approved Pakistan Telecommunication Company Ltd’s acquisition of Telenor Pakistan, imposing a series of conditions including a bar on cross-subsidies and mandatory participation in the next spectrum auction.
The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) said the parties -- PTCL, Pakistan Telecom Mobile Ltd (PTML) and the post-merger entity, MergeCo -- must maintain a transparent pricing structure for wholesale and retail services to prevent cross-subsidisation. PTCL will be prohibited from using revenues from upstream services to subsidise downstream offerings or from offering unreasonably low or predatory prices that could foreclose competition.
The PTA said the notifying parties and PTML/MergeCo must continue to operate licensed systems and services in accordance with existing licence conditions and the legal framework. PTML and Telenor Pakistan will remain separate legal entities until the authority decides on their amalgamation application. Until then, both licensees must adhere to their respective licence terms and remain individually responsible for compliance.
PTCL will assume all liabilities and obligations linked to the licences held by Telenor Pakistan, Telenor LDI Communication Pvt and Orient Towers. The parties will be restricted from introducing or modifying brand names without prior written approval from the authority, which requires at least 30 days’ notice and clearance of outstanding regulatory dues, except where barred by a court order.
The companies must provide non-discriminatory and transparent access to infrastructure and bandwidth to all telecom licensees, and PTCL will be prohibited from entering agreements that impose exclusivity or resale restrictions limiting competitors’ access to bandwidth.
The notifying parties and PTML/MergeCo will also be required to ensure that any telecom-related services are procured on an arm’s length basis and must provide information to the regulator upon request. They must maintain separate accounts for all business units and submit sufficiently detailed annual accounts to the PTA.
