Ex-post analysis of two mobile telecom mergers : T-Mobile/tele.ring in Austria and T-Mobile/Orange in the Netherlands

Recently increased attention is being paid to ex-post evaluation of competition policy enforcement decisions, and in particular merger decisions. In the United States there is already an established and voluminous body of studies that covers several industries and several types of decisions. In Europe, too, in the last decade a limited, but growing, number of ex-post assessments have contributed to our understanding of the effects of consummated mergers. These studies have traditionally been the outcome of academic research, but more recently are becoming part of the agenda of competition authorities. This report is the outcome of a joint project of the European Commission (DG Competition), the Netherlands Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM) and the Austrian Regulatory Authority for Broadcasting and Telecommunications (RTR). The primary aim of the study is twofold: to identify methodological issues and develop insights which can be effectively applied in future ex-post evaluation projects; and to carry out an ex-post evaluation of two consummated mergers in the mobile telecommunications industry. The mobile telecom industry is an industry of significant interest for merger control, as the European mobile telecom sector has witnessed several recent mergers between independent mobile network operators in a number of different national markets. The two cases we study are: the T-Mobile/tele.ring merger in Austria, approved with remedies in April 2006, and the T-Mobile/Orange merger in the Netherlands, approved without conditions in August 2007. The mobile telecom industry also presents a number of interesting specificities (complex tariff offers, non-linear prices) that this study tries to address and that might also be relevant to other industries.