Fast-changing industry provides plenty of work for market-watchers.
These are delirious days for telecommunications market trainspotters.
Yesterday the Commerce Commission issued its last word on mobile termination rates; a week ago it released a report on the state of the industry in 2010; the day before that the Government announced a joint investigation with Australia of transtasman roaming services; and simmering away for weeks has been discontent over the Telecommunications (TSO, Broadband and Other Matters) Amendment Bill.
Yes, says Rosalie Nelson, telecommunications research manager at analyst firm IDC, there's plenty for industry watchers to get excited about.
"You have the underlying market changes - in technology, devices and user behaviour - and the financial implications of that for an industry that is not growing. At the same time, you have this very complex set of regulatory, competitive and policy dynamics," Nelson says.
An industry in ferment is fine for analysts, since it gives them something to do. It should, in theory, be good for consumers, too, if competition is doing its work.
If competition is failing, we rely on the regulator to nudge service providers into line.
That's what yesterday's mobile termination rates announcement was about.
For years, Vodafone and Telecom have been charging over the odds for calls between each other's networks, finally provoking the Commerce Commission to step in.
Telecommunications Commissioner Ross Patterson has halved the termination rate from today, with it halving it again by next April, in the hope that will lead to cheaper calls (although the telcos are saying it won't), give 2degrees a leg-up against its better-established rivals (they each have about four times as many subscribers as it) and get us talking more on our mobiles.
The commission seldom bares its teeth and justification in this instance can be found in the 2010 market report that Patterson released last week.
It shows there are 400,000 more cellphone subscribers than people in this country.
But at 79 minutes a month we have only about a 10th as much to say as Americans, are a fifth as long-winded as the Chinese and talk only two-fifths as much as the British.
When we do call, we're five times more likely to ring people on the same network because it's cheaper than off-net calling, which explains why hundreds of thousands of us have a phone for each of the two main networks.
Nelson thinks Patterson's intervention may result in telco plans with more free call minutes, but she is sceptical that it will cure the on-net, off-net pricing distortion.
She thinks that would take retail - as opposed to wholesale - pricing action.
Separately, Patterson looks likely to lose any price-monitoring role as the Government does the legislative groundwork for its $1.35 billion ultra-fast broadband (UFB) initiative.
The Telecommunications (TSO, Broadband and Other Matters) Amendment Bill proposes a regulatory holiday for the successful UFB bidders until 2020, to "avoid burdening infant businesses".
Patterson wasn't prepared to say what effect that might have on competition when asked last week.
"I can't comment because it is a policy area. What we have said about regulation generally is that as you get effective competition, you would expect regulation to be scaled back."
If the bill's intent sounds like the opposite, it has certainly stirred up plenty of opposition, from telecommunications user group Tuanz, Federated Farmers, internetNZ, consumers and key telcos, not including Telecom, which is the leading contender for UFB contracts.
The bill's opponents will discover the results of their lobbying when it is reported back to Parliament on May 16, with Communications and Information Technology Minister Steven Joyce expecting it to be passed by June.
Nelson can understand the industry disquiet.
"You have a Government that is in multiple roles as a key investor in the UFB project, as a supplier, as a facilitator, as a demand aggregator and also de facto regulator over the 10-year period."
Any assurances the minister may give are lost in a tendering process that lacks transparency, she says.
Last week Joyce was active on another front as well. With Australian counterpart Stephen Conroy, he announced a joint investigation of transtasman roaming services.
Stories abound of "bill shock", the enormous charges run up on their Vodafone, Telecom - and, reportedly worst of all, 2degrees - accounts by hapless Kiwi mobile internet users across the ditch.
It should be remembered that Vodafone and Telecom are jointly being paid $285 million by the Government to deliver rural broadband services - an irony that doesn't escape Sydney-based telecoms analyst Paul Budde.
"That is why the UFB undertakings, and a regime to monitor them, are so important," Budde says.
All power to the telco trainspotters.
Milestones
April 28: NZ and Australia announce joint investigation into transtasman roaming services
May 5: Commerce Commission reveals its decision on mobile termination rates
May 16: Telecommunications Amendment Bill expected to be reported back to Parliament, setting out legal framework for Government's ultra-fast broadband initiative
Anthony Doesburg is an Auckland technology journalist
