The Competition Appeal Tribunal has today ruled that Ofcom’s BCMR decision be quashed and remitted to the regulator.
The BCMR decision was published in April 2016. BT, CityFibre, and TalkTalk launched appeals against various aspects of the decision in June 2016 – the “BCMR Appeals”.
The Competition Appeal Tribunal handed down a ruling today, finding that Ofcom erred on three counts:
“(1) Ofcom erred in concluding that it was appropriate to define a single product market for CISBO services of all bandwidths;
(2) Ofcom erred in concluding that the RoUK comprises a single geographic market; and
(3) Ofcom erred in its determination of the boundary between the competitive core segments and the terminating segments of BT’s network.”
A complete copy of the ruling can be found here.
Preiskel & Co’s Tim Cowen and his team advised CityFibre in relation to the BCMR appeals. Tim is delighted to welcome the decision and commented that it raises profound issues for the proper assessment and regulation of BT as a dominant operator, for the way Ofcom assesses markets, and for the impact of these assessments on infrastructure competition and investment in the UK.