Ofcom has been the subject of criticism at the CMA’s 2008 Annual Conference in London after the Communications Management Association accused it of failure to represent the ICT needs of business in drafting regulations.

Carolyn Kimber, chairman of the CMA spoke out that businesses were in need of increased competition and choice for mobile and broadband services but stated that Ofcom seemed to be heavily tied down in consumer competition only.

“We cannot repeat too often to people that business needs are not the goals of the consumer. The communication needs of the business users are overlooked by lawmakers and regulators in favour of consumer needs and the needs of the supplier community,” Kimber said.

In her speech she accused The Office of Communications of failure to business matters seriously, especially when it came to attracting internal investment from enterprises abroad:

“Countries like Japan have invested heavily in its ICT infrastructure and have linked that investment to a 40% increase in Japanese GDP. I can see no progress here,” said Kimber.

In the past Kimber has openly expressed her negative views on Ofcom’s recent proposal to de-regulate broadband wholesale markets. In doing so Kimber suggests that business needs would be ignored.

Peter Phillips, partner of strategy and market developments at Ofcom spoke back, commenting that there was a “misconception” over the time the regulator spent dealing with consumer affairs:

“When we speak about consumers, we meant the full gamut of enterprise customers, and not just the domestic ones. We look to deregulate where there is a case for both the business and consumer,” said Phillips.

Source: ComputerWeekly

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