The European Commission presented the highly anticipated “telecommunications package”, a set of measures to boost Europe’s competitiveness in the sector,on September 11. The package, one of the largest initiatives undertaken by the EC so far, was presented in Strasbourg by its president, former Portuguese Prime Minister Durão Barroso.
Amongst the measures presented was the elimination of roaming costs for incoming calls, text messages or data (when the user is abroad) by 2014, which would lead to the elimination of roaming costs altogether by 2016.
One of the aims of the package, which took months to prepare, is to place Europe in a privileged position in the world’s digital economy, even though its telecommunications sector is often considered a low-performing one when compared to those of the US or South Korea.
Preparing to take action in several sectors, the EC’s goal is to simplify current laws to improve mobile connections and develop the 4G network.
