s'pore expands access to singtel's undersea cables S'pore...

s'pore expands access to singtel's undersea cables S'pore expands access to SingTel's undersea cables
September 10, 2004 7:47am ET (Reuters)

SINGAPORE, Sept 10 (Reuters) - Singapore will allow greater access to Singapore Telecommunications Ltd.'s submarine cable capacity to boost competition, a regulator said on Friday.

More than 90 percent of submarine cables entering Singapore pass initially through SingTel's submarine cable landing stations. The traffic is then routed through infrastructure run by various licensed operators before reaching consumers.

The new rules could benefit StarHub, Singapore's second-largest telecoms firm, No. 2 U.S. long-distance phone company MCI Inc. and Reach, an undersea cable joint venture between Australia's Telstra Corp. and Hong Kong's PCCW Ltd. .

"Submarine cable landing stations are critical telecoms infrastructure and efforts should be made to ensure that they do not become bottlenecks to telecoms service provision," the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA) said.

Greater access to SingTel's submarine cable infrastructure would give rival operators more scope to expand their service offerings, IDA Deputy Chief Executive Leong Keng Thai said.

"This would lead to greater choice and more competitive prices for end users, and increase the attractiveness of Singapore as a telecoms hub," he told reporters.

The IDA's decision will take effect by year end. Analysts said the move would have little impact on SingTel.

"This is slightly negative for SingTel, but the impact is limited -- its (submarine cable) capacity sales account for only a very small part of total revenues," said Brenda Lee, analyst with Daiwa Institute of Research. SingTel shares ended one cent down at S$2.34 on Friday.