As a condition of participation in the ultra-fast broadband initiative, Chorus entered into an open access fibre deed (the Fibre Deed) under section 156AD of the Telecommunications Act 2001.
A copy of Chorus’ Fibre Deed can be found on Crown Infrastructure Partners’ website.
The Commission monitors and enforces compliance with the Fibre Deed and the Line-of-Business (LOB) restrictions.
The LOB restrictions impact Chorus in the following ways:
Section 69O prohibits Chorus from participating in the supply of a telecommunications service to a person if 25% or more of the services supplied by Chorus to that person in any year are or will be supplied for that person’s own use or consumption. This prevents Chorus from supplying any telecommunications services to an end-user.
Section 69R requires the Fibre Deed to prohibit Chorus from participating in services above layer 2 services. The Fibre Deed contains this prohibition at clause 7.5.
Section 69S prevents Chorus from providing telecommunications links to end-users, except between the end-user’s building and the Chorus local aggregation point.
Together, these LOB restrictions prevent Chorus from establishing itself as a vertically integrated player in retail markets.
Below, you’ll find an exchange of letters between the Commission and Vodafone. These letters discuss Vodafone’s concerns about conduct by Chorus in retail broadband markets and potential breaches of the LOB restrictions in the Telecommunications Act 2001.
We have chosen to publish the exchange to provide greater transparency about our approach.
