The Commerce Commission will hold a conference to consider TeamTalk Limited's application for authorisation to acquire Telecom New Zealand Limited's trunked mobile radio business, Fleetlink, tomorrow (Wednesday, May 3).
The Commission's Commerce Act Manager, Geoff Thorn, said that the Commission expects to release its final decision by May 17.
The Commerce Act prohibits business acquisitions that result in dominance being acquired or strengthened in any market. However, it allows an otherwise prohibited acquisition to be authorised if the Commission is satisfied that public benefits from the proposal outweigh its detriments to competition.
On March 24 the Commission released its draft determination stating that, based on information then available, public benefits from the proposal outweighed detriments to competition by between $3.6 million and $10.7 million over five years.
The Act gives the Commission 60 working days in which to investigate an application, release a draft determination giving its preliminary view, receive submissions on the draft determination, hold a conference and then draw together the information from its own investigation, the submissions and the conference to make its final decision.
