The Swedish government has approved legislation giving the national regulator PTS the power to impose functional separation on dominant network operators. The bill, entitled 'Functional separation for better broadband competition', is intended to improve competition in the broadband market. The PTS can order a separation of an operator's network operations and retail services if the dominant operator has an unfair advantage vis-a-vis other operators in the market, and other operators do not have sufficient insight into the dominant operator's network operations, despite other measures from the PTS. The government's proposal means that business units that administer, operate and supply the copper access network will be separated from other operations, particularly sales operations, so that all actors are given access on equal terms to the copper access network. The proposed act will also give the dominant operator the alternative option of implementing functional separation voluntarily. A voluntary separation of this kind can be approved by the PTS in a decision. It is proposed that the new provisions enter into force on 1 July.
