BTRC to go for impact study on proposed Robi-Airtel merger

Telecoms regulators BTRC is going for an impact study on the proposal to merge the business of Robi and Airtel.

The Department of International Business under the Faculty of Business Studies at the Dhaka University and the Faculty of Engineering of American International University have been approached to submit the estimated cost of the study.

BTRC Secretary Md Sarwar Alam told the bdnews24.com that such study had became imperative as it was for the first time that two operators in Bangladesh’s mobile sector have decided for the amalgamation.

“We have sent proposal to the two universities to conduct the study to find what the results and reaction to the tie-up will be,” he said.  

The proposal letter, signed by the Director of the BTRC’s Legal and Licensing Division MA Taleb, stated that the study report would focus on eight main subjects and objectives.

What will be the socio-economic impact of the merger; how to overcome and devise strategy to deal with negative impact, if any; what will be the impact of the merger on employment and whether there will be any provision for VRS for employees not willing to join the merged company are some of the core issues the study will examine.

It will also look into the likely impact of the merger on mobile phone market, particularly competitiveness.

The study will also analyse the impact of the proposed merger on services and rights of the users and others related issues, including share capital.  

It will try to find out whether there will be any impact of the amalgamation on the spectrum auction and the government’s revenue earnings.

The universities have been asked to also submit the terms and conditions to the BTRC chairman.

The proposal letter mentioned that the report should be filed within eight weeks.

Mobile-phone operators Robi and Airtel wrote to the BTRC in September seeking permission for the merger.

In the letter, they had said Malaysia-based Axiata Group and NTT DoCoMo Inc of Japan would have 75 percent share and India’s Bharti Airtel would retain 25 percent share after the merger.

The operators had said the code for Airtel numbers (016) would remain unchanged, but the merged operator would stop issuing numbers with this code after three years.

In the letter, the operators also said the subscribers would not face any problem because of the amalgamation.