PHONE PENALTY

French telecom operator Orange is fined ¢350 million for breaching competition rules.

French telecommunications operator Orange has been fined €350 million ($380 million) for breaching competition rules in the corporate market, the French competition regulator said on Thursday.

The fine, the biggest the regulator has ever slapped on an individual company, comes after competitors Bouygues Telecom and SFR complained that Orange had been hindering free competition in the business market for fixed and mobile phones since the early 2000s, the authority said.

Bouygues has since dropped out of proceedings after receiving a €300 million payoff from Orange.

Orange had established a number of anti-competition practices, especially loyalty schemes, that stopped corporates from picking a different operator for even part of their telecoms needs, the authority said. This amounted to “serious malpractice”, it said.

Orange also restricted other operators’ access to client information it held thanks to its former monopoly position as historic fixed-line operator France Telecom, it said.

The authority said it ordered Orange, which had been cooperating in the investigation, to immediately re-establish a “healthy competition situation” in its markets.

“We must ensure that companies are not held captive by a single operator for too long,” said a spokesperson for the authority. “Our legislation has done a lot for individuals in this respect, but very little for companies who are finding it more difficult to switch from one operator to another.”

Orange took the fine, which represents less than 1% of its annual sales of €39 billion in 2014, in stride.

“We set aside a provision long ago more than big enough to cover this fine, so it will have no impact on our results for the year,” said Orange chairman Stephane Richard.

The regulator said the fine was negotiated with Orange. The firm’s share price was unaffected by the fine.