Regulator urges Deutsche Telekom to reach amicable agreements with rivals for access to VDSL network

The president of the German telecoms regulator Bundesnetzagentur, Matthias Kurth, has urged Deutsche Telekom to negotiate deals with rivals for access to its planned VDSL network, in order to avoid intervention from regulators. In an interview with Financial Times Deutschland, Kurth said that Deutsche Telekom could not prove that the products on offer on the VDSL network constitute a new market, an argument that would exempt the network from regulation. The regulator is torn between the threat of legal action from the European Union and the need to give Deutsche Telekom room to recoup the EUR3 billion that it is investing in the network.