Vodafone takes Dutch telecoms incumbent KPN to court

Vodafone has taken Dutch former state telecoms company KPN to court to claim damages of €115m for anti-competitive behaviour.

The FTSE 100 group's local subsidiary Vodafone Netherlands has claimed that KPN's ownership of the telecoms infrastructure in the Netherlands allowed it to delay by three years the nationwide launch of Vodafone’s 'all-in-one' package of TV, fixed-line broadband and fixed-line telephone proposition, which allowed KPN to gain a crucial headstart in this new converged market.

As KPN owns the wire and fibre optic networks in the Netherlands, all other operators rely on this network in order to compete.

Vodafone said KPN delayed delivery, despite its "commitments to deliver the technology needed" and therefore these delays "resulted in Vodafone Netherlands being unable to compete effectively with KPN (and cable providers) in the Dutch telecoms market until 2014".

KPN did however, launch its own ‘all-in-one’ packages, which Vodafone argued prevented its Netherlands arm from gaining much market share in the early period of telecoms convergence, when more than 100,000 households per quarter chose to move to ‘all-in-one’ products.

"KPN’s refusal to supply Vodafone Netherlands qualifies as abuse of a dominant market position and resulted in an estimated €115m in damages for Vodafone Netherlands," the UK company said.

It added that the legal action against KPN was in line with similar court action by Vodafone and regulators elsewhere in Europe where incumbent operators have abused or are suspected of abusing their dominant positions.

The UK's Ofcom is investigating incumbent BT's Openreach infrastructure arm, including examining whether it has used loopholes to avoid penalties for the late installation of fibre-optic cables for business customers.