The national Telecommunications Commission (NTC) plans to revise its licence fees next year. Commissioner Sethaporn Cusripituck said it was time for the revision as the same rates have been used for more than two years.

The licence fees vary from Bt10,000 to 5 per cent of the licensee's annual revenue, depending on the licence type.

Earlier, Sethaporn mentioned that the NTC would soon revise the fee for fixed telephone licences in order to promote investment.

In a separate matter, the NTC yesterday organised a second public hearing on measures to promote fair competition.

One area of concern for larger telecom operators is that the watchdog may consider them dominant if they have more than 25 per cent of the market, meaning companies will be subject to the NTC's stricter controls.

Many telecom operator representatives at the hearing said the NTC should produce clear and transparent methods to define a 25-per-cent market share.

They argued that in some markets it was easy for the operators to be branded as dominant as there were only a few competitors.

Sethaporn said the NTC would not only consider market share, but also take into account a long list of factors such as the business's size and its technological strength to consider which telecom operators were dominant.

He said the 25-per-cent figure was in line with the Competition Act of 1999.

The NTC will also apply the measures in terms of the market segment, instead of on the overall strength of a group of companies.

For example, it will not count CAT Telecom and its cellular operator concessionaires as one entity in one market but examine which operator dominates each segment.

Sethaporn rejected the criticism of some participants that the NTC competition measure was intended to 'bonsai' the major players and protect only the small players.

He added that, as with regulatory fees, all regulations could be reviewed after their implementation to assess their effectiveness in the changing situation.

"The regulations are suitable for this moment, but they can be revised after this year," he said.

Sirivish Toomgum

The Nation