Brussels has indeed incorporated some long-standing demands from operators into the new regulatory framework, such as the geographical segmentation of the market when examining potential competition issues, and the principle that those using other networks must somehow share the economic risk involved in these investments.

However, major companies consider the new regulation a "missed opportunity" because it maintains price controls, but without specifying them and leaving them in the hands of national regulators, since it is also a non-binding recommendation. The result, explained industry sources, is that "things remain unclear, and this is not particularly conducive to planning multi-million euro investments."

In addition to the new regulatory framework for fiber optic networks, the Commissioner for Telecommunications, Neelie Kroes, will ask Member States to allocate part of the electromagnetic spectrum previously used for analog television to mobile broadband services by January 1, 2013, at the latest. Specifically, the European Commission will propose dedicating the 800 MHz band to mobile broadband.