Merger guidelines are in place, cap at 67 per cent

The government today issued final guidelines for mergers and acquisitions within a telecom circle with the condition that the market share of merged entity would not exceed 67 per cent.

‘‘In order to ensure that sufficient competition exists, merger of licences will be permitted subject to the condition that, post merger, there are at least three operators in that service area for that service,’’ the guidelines issued by the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) said.

The merger of licences is restricted to the same service area and this would be effective only in the fixed and mobile telephones. According to the guidelines issued by the government today: ‘‘With a prior approval of DoT, merger of licence is permitted in categories — cellular licence with cellular licence, basic with basic, unified with unified, basic with unified and cellular with unified,’’ it said.