Technological convergence: regulatory competition. The British case of digital television

This article reviews British regulatory frameworks and market structure in the analogue television and telecommunications sectors, now converging in the technology of digital TV. In particular it points to the de facto monopoly of access to satellite analogue broadcasting by BSkyB and the impact that market structure has had on the negotiations for a new regulatory regime for digital television. It discusses the problems arising from the overlap of regulation as the technologies have converged and the approach of the British telecommunications regulator, Oftel, to the regulation of Conditional Access. It ends with the view that the case of digital TV may bring about an amalgamation in the separate regulatory institutions for the two sectors