BRUSSELS: The heads of European telecoms firms, including Orange and Vodafone, on have urged the EU to make tech and streaming giants pay for the massive amounts of bandwidth they use.
Telecoms giants say that they need more money to maintain and update the infrastructure to meet Europe’s voracious data needs, and that it would be fairer if firms like Netflix contributed towards the cost.
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The CEOs said the European Union estimated that at least 174 billion euros of new investment is needed by 2030 to meet connectivity targets.“The telecoms sector is currently not strong enough to meet that demand,” said the CEOs, including Orange’s Christel Heydemann and Telefonica’s Jose Maria Alvarez-Pallete.
While earlier this year the European Parliament voiced support for the measure, not all of the EU’s 27 member states are on board.The Computer & Communications Industry Association , one of the main tech lobbying groups, has repeatedly argued against the measure, warning that fees would have disastrous consequences for European consumers.