The Mobile Communications Environment in the European Union: Systems, Regulations, and Consequences in the Past, Present, and Future

By creating a single market and introducing competition and the de facto global standard, GSM, the European Union (EU) achieved economies of scale and has been the world's leader in the mobile communications sector. A number of interrelated issues surrounding the third-generation (3G) system have recently become visible, however. The first indication is the high 3G spectrum license prices mobile operators had to pay. Although technology promises capabilities far greater than fixed public telephone systems and can be one of the means to achieve the EU's information society framework, there is much uncertainly about the future of the 3G market.