It’s an old refrain of telecom operators. They would like the web giants to contribute financially to the networks and have intensified their lobbying on this subject for several months. And it seems that this request has finally been heard in Europe. Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager made statements to this effect at a press conference reported by Reuters.
Towards a fairer contribution?
“I think there is one issue that we need to look at very carefully, and that is the issue of equitable contribution to telecommunications networks”, she said. In the viewfinder, streaming service providers like Netflix, but also platforms that host a lot of videos such as Google with YouTube or Meta with Facebook. All this beautiful people would generate a lot of traffic without worrying about what it costs to make it work behind the scenes. “We are in the process of understanding in depth how this could be activated”said Vestager.
If Margrethe Vestager spoke, it is because a new study was published earlier this week on the weight of GAFAM in global Internet traffic. According to figures from Axon, Meta, Alphabet, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft and Netflix alone accounted for more than 56% of all global data traffic last year. A level that does not seem overestimated compared to Arcep’s 2021 State of the Internet report. He had then established that Netflix, Google, Akamai and Facebook represented 50% of Internet traffic in France.
Axon deduces that the tech giants “would cost” nearly 28 billion euros to operators per year due to this intensive use of infrastructure. However, he also recalls that operators have invested 500 billion euros over the past ten years in telecom infrastructure. The report would therefore consider a direct Big Tech contribution to infrastructure projects rather than a tax or contribution to a fund.
A study commissioned by the operators
Obviously, the study was appropriately commissioned by ETNO (European Telecommunications Network Operators’ Association), a pressure group of operators, including Altice, Orange and Deutsche Telekom. She speculates that if these GAFAM contributed 20 billion euros to the networks, this could generate 840,000 new jobs by 2025 and reduce the sector’s energy consumption. This last point is the most debatable since it is mainly based on “hypotheses” of reducing energy consumption.
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Of course, the GAFAMs do not share this position. Some players point out that they already contribute financially to the networks. This is the case of Netflix, which has invested in its own Open Connect content distribution network. It installs its servers with operators and also offers them interconnections at exchange points.
But more generally, Big Tech considers that they create value with their services and content and that this attracts and retains operators’ subscribers. The showdown is therefore far from over.
Sources: FinancialTimes, Reuters, AND NO