Call for Inputs: The Impact of 5G on Regulation

BEREC (the Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications) is seeking comments from businesses and organisations who are interested in or planning to utilise 5G connectivity. 5G is expected to enable new use cases across a range of different industry sectors (sometimes referred to as verticals). Since many aspects of regulation are involved in the 5G ecosystem, how they are address can affect the pace at which innovate services are brought to the market.

Built on work that was previously undertaken by BEREC, this project aims to assist the National Regulatory Authorities for electronic communications in anticipating the issues involved in regulation and support the pace of innovation. BEREC has published a number of reports related to 5G about fixed/mobile convergence, infrastructure sharing, spectrum authorisation, award procedures and coverage obligations. Infrastructure sharing and monitoring of mobile coverage were further studied and published as BEREC common position.

The Working Group Planning & Future Trends (BEREC EG PFT) is seeking comments on a list of topics (available as a downloaded annex to the call) identified as crucial to 5G regulation. BEREC invites stakeholders to determine whether the list is complete and indicate which regulatory aspects are missing. If a topic is not on the list, stakeholders are asked to briefly describe the missing aspect and indicate what position BEREC could take. Stakeholders can also suggest which aspects should get BEREC’s priority in the coming three years, with priority both in terms of relevance and urgency. Lastly, BEREC is also seeking feedback regarding the relevance of use cases discussed in the Implications of 5G Deployments on Future Business Models. The feedback they seek are whether the uses cases mentioned in the study still representative for the currently identified use cases and which other important use cases should be studied.

Building on this initial round of stakeholder comments, BEREC will develop a report concerning the impact of 5G on regulation and the role of regulation in enabling the 5G ecosystem. As this is an early call for input from stakeholders, the report will be the first step in identifying the responsibilities that may be addressed by BEREC or other competent authorities. All those that are interested in responding should send their input to pm@berec.europa.eu by 2 September.

The report will be adopted for public consultation at the 41st BEREC ordinary meeting on 5-6 December, and from 11 December stakeholders will be invited to respond to the consultation of the report.