The European Commission has granted French telecoms authorities the right to regulate the wholesale price of mobile phone text messages, an EU first.
European Union information society commissioner Viviane Reding has approved a request to set the prices for SMS between the main mobile providers in France, according to a document from the EU's commission.
The commission, the EU's executive arm, said a request by French telecoms regulator ARCEP was 'reasonable, proportionate and justified', in a letter published on its website.
If France acts on the EU green light, it will be the first European country to fix the wholesale price of text messages - the prices which operators charge each other to carry text messages on their networks.
The new tariffs suggested by ARCEP are three cent per SM for the operators Orange and SFR and 3.5 cent for Bouygues Telecom, compared with 4.3 cent currently.
ARCEP set out its SMS regulation plans to the EU commission in mid-June. In 2005, some 12.7 million text messages were sent in France, generating a turnover of more than €1 billion, according to the telecoms body.
