The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

Cable Bahamas believes that competition in the Bahamian cellular market is “at best two to three years away”, making it “premature” to devise a pricing regime for calls between mobile phones.

Responding to comments by both the Bahamas Telecommunications Company (BTC) and Digicel over the recent Utilities Regulation & Competition Authority (URCA) consultation on call termination services, the BISX-listed communications provider shot down Digicel’s proposal for a ‘calling party pays’ charging regime in the Bahamian cellular market.

Digicel had called for this to be introduced for calls to cellular phones from fixed-line and other cellular handsets, and suggested that a termination rate equivalent to BTC’s 6.03 cents per minute for international calls be set.

But, pointing out that BTC’s cellular monopoly is set to continue well into 2014 (April 6, 2014, being the date at which the auction process for a second licence can start), Cable Bahamas said Digicel’s suggestions were ahead of the game.

“With no other parties even granted a licence to provide mobile services at the current time, the prospect of mobile competition in the Bahamas is at best two to three years away given the timeframes necessary to design and build mobile network facilities and launch new, alternative mobile services,” the BISX-listed communications provider told URCA.

“Consequently, Cable Bahamas considers that it would be premature in the context of the present proceeding to adopt any specific charging regime for mobile-to-mobile services, let alone set interim domestic mobile termination rates for such services, as suggested by Digicel.”

Cable Bahamas is thus placing the true arrival of competition in the Bahamian cellular market as coming in 2015-2016, meaning consumers have to wait a bit longer for choice and, potentially, improved prices and services.

This places the company at odds with the majority shareholder for its main rival, BTC, and the Government.

Tony Rice, Cable & Wireless Communications (CWC) chief executive, told a June conference call that he expected cellular competition in the Bahamas to arrive in late 2014 - a year to two ahead of Cable Bahamas expectations. And his analysis was agreed with by Prime Minister Perry Christie.

“We’ll be ready for competition as and when it comes. Our guess is towards the end of next year,” Mr Rice said at the time. “[That’s] what we’re anticipating. But let’s wait and see what emerges from that process.

“Obviously, there has to be a licensing process. I don’t know who it will be, so we’ll have to wait and see, but we’ll be ready whenever that crystallises.”

And he added: “The answer is that the liberalisation can kick-off, the process can kick-off, from April 1, 2014, under the agreement that we had with the Government.

“We are anticipating that that will be the case, and we are getting on with structuring BTC in a way that it can be ready for competition.”