Recently, True and DTAC merger was announced by Telenor, the parent company of DTAC, and conglomerate Charoen Pokphand (CP) Group, the parent company of True, at a joint press conference on Nov 22. The merger was almost immediately questioned by the public about how monopoly the market will be, as there will be only 2 service providers if the merger is successful and was also faced regulatory challenges made by related authorities including the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC).
However, according to an anonymous source at NBTC, the merger is expected to survive the challenges as the two companies are not telecom licensees, instead, they are seen as holding firms that are not under the Trade Competition Commission’s regulations.
It happens that True has its mobile business subsidiary, True Move H Universal Communication which obtained telecom licenses through spectrum range auctions, while DTAC has a business subsidiary, DTAC TriNet which has telecom licenses granted by the NBTC.
For the merger, the two companies said they will join hands to establish a tech company in addition to the traditional telecom business they already have.
True and DTAC appear to act as holding firms without actual operations, meaning the merger will probably pass regulatory hurdles from the Trade Competition Commission too, the anonymous source said.
Based on Section 21 of the Telecommunications Business Act, the NBTC has the power to iron out measures to prevent telecom licensees from doing anything that would create market dominance or undermine competition.
In addition, if the NBTC agrees that the acquisition would create a monopoly or pose a threat to fair business competition, NBTC may issue an order to ban such action or roll out special measures to govern it. (NNT)
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