Regulators in North Africa could stifle Triple Play

France’s Triple Play, which offers unlimited calls from landlines in Morocco and Algeria to France, may be running into problems with government regulators.

The service, which was inaugurated for customers of Moroccan origin at the end of 2009, is expected to be a huge success – but it first has to get off the ground.

“Right now, it looks like the Algerian government and telecom operators are really pushing against it and we have already seen a number of efforts put down or postponed as a result of this,” said Hasan Laamrani, a Tunis-based telecom analyst with a major European consultancy.

He says that governments and their telecom cohorts are worried that by introducing these cheaper options it will hurt the overall profits of the companies.

“At the end of the day, the telecom operators are trying to cover their bases and get things worked out in their favor,” he added, “at the detriment of families and customers.”

“Only this week Orange Tunisie was forced to delay sales of its Livebox product which is designed as a Triple Play device. The reason? It wanted to be able to offer VoiP services on the data connection, providing much needed competition for the state-owned incumbent Tunisie Telecom,” wrote a Star Africa editorial.

The network, when and if, approved by the government, will give Algerians the same opportunities as their Moroccan counterparts – the ability to call their relatives and friends via the Internet for a much cheaper value than is currently offered by local telecom operators.

By Jonathan Terry