Telco rivals put disputes on fast-track

By RICHARD BRADDELL

Clear Communications and Telecom have consolidated a raft of legal disputes with the intention of getting them before the court this year, rather than next year as had been expected.

Revealing the agreement yesterday, outgoing Clear Communications chief executive Tim Cullinane classed the arrangement as being among the achievements during his two-year tenure that had refocused Clear's strategy and given it a coherent business plan.

These included the Vodafone cellular reselling agreement, the LMDS local wireless rollout announced in March, and Telecom's acceptance of Clear's request that their contentious interconnection agreement be renegotiated.

But while the resulting truce in the two companies' 0867 interconnection war was accorded a rapturous welcome from both sides, Mr Cullinane made it plain that detente would still be subordinate to proper commercial arrangements.

"We have deliberately set a goal of a 12-month agreement to take account of the changes that will become relevant as a result of the commission of inquiry and the changes in our industry at the present time," he said.

Conceding that Clear had drifted sideways in the months preceding British Telecom's buyout of Clear's other three shareholders in June 1999, Mr Cullinane said the company had not progressed as well as it could because of unwillingness to come up with development capital.

With more than $300 million in new capital committed by British Telecom, Clear had made the transition from a residential-focused toll provider to an internet and business-oriented company.

Management had been restructured, with five appointees filling key executive roles.

They were British Telecom-seconded Rhoda Holmes, with responsibility for corporate and regulatory affairs; Kevin Millar, who led negotiations with Telecom that produced the truce on their 0867 dispute; marketing and online services director Ian Scherger; IT director Graham Walmsley; and human resources director Peter Merry.

Mr Merry's role in human resources had been crucial in reducing staff churn, typically high in the industry, but unacceptably so at Clear when it peaked at 25 per cent.

Clear was building out further central business district fibre optics and was unconcerned that the new Telstra Saturn joint venture might have stolen its thunder, since the latter's $1.2 billion five-year expansion plans would only give it what Clear had already, Mr Cullinane said.

He was set to leave Clear at the end of June, but will stay to the end of July at the request of British Telecom.

A successor has yet to be named, and that has been held up by restructuring at British Telecom in which operations are being split into global product lines.

Mr Cullinane expected his successor, most likely a British Telecom employee, to be named before he left.

He was less convinced that Clear itself would be organised into British Telecom's global structure since it had already undergone a substantial restructuring of its own and its turnover of $300 million was not of a size to warrant it.