The Hon. Eranga Weeraratne - Deputy Minister of Digital Economy

¶ 01 Mr. Speaker, today we take up an important regulation on shared use of telecommunications infrastructure. Thank you for allowing me to speak first on this.

¶ 02 Taking the history of telecommunications in Sri Lanka, until 1996 Sri Lanka Telecom had a monopoly. The main reason was the high capital expenditure needed to develop infrastructure. Only SLT could build the fixed-line network then. In 1996 that monopoly was ended and other companies were allowed—Suntel, Lanka Bell, etc. In 1989 Celtel began mobile telecommunications, followed by Dialog in 1993, later Airtel and others. Many companies established networks according to their capital capacity, but coverage and quality problems persisted; national coverage did not reach 100 percent, roughly 95 percent at best, and some providers still do not reach even that.

¶ 03 Therefore, instead of each operator separately building its own infrastructure, it is necessary to pool existing and future infrastructure and move towards sharing. This is the global trend. Infrastructure sharing reduces environmental and urban-planning impacts from multiple towers and repeated trenching, and enables any service provider to offer services faster.

¶ 04 We regulate sharing under four layers: - Passive infrastructure: towers, masts, poles, generators, air conditioning, ducts, and duct fiber. These do not themselves carry signals but support them; they can be shared among operators. - Active infrastructure sharing: radio equipment such as antennas can be shared. This is MORAN—Multi-Operator Radio Access Network—sharing. - Spectrum sharing together with active components: for example, we issued 5G spectrum last December. Only two companies acquired it due to financial capacity. The third company’s customers should not be denied 5G; spectrum and active RAN sharing via MOCN—Multi-Operator Core Network—sharing—allows a licensee to enable another operator’s customers to access 5G. For clarity: “core network sharing” in the sense of sharing switching platforms, HLR databases, etc., is not envisaged in these regulations. Sharing the single core is undesirable and raises resilience and national security risks. The August 2024 amendments and today’s regulations do not mandate core network sharing—only passive, active RAN, and spectrum-layer sharing.

¶ 05 Globally, infrastructure sharing reduces initial capex by 30–50 percent and also lowers opex: power, batteries, maintenance workforce costs can be reduced by 20–40 percent. Our “Gamata Sannivedanaya” (Connectivity to Villages) project aims to deliver services in difficult regions. Through TRCSL we will support operators to build about 150 new towers annually, with equal access for all operators to those sites. These regulations enable that.

¶ 06 We also reduce foreign exchange outflows: towers, radio antennas, and steel often are imported; with shared sites, fewer total imports are needed. Powering sites is expensive—grid power, generators, diesel, and batteries; sharing lowers these costs and forex leakage. Lower industry costs allow better service quality and, over time, lower consumer tariffs.

¶ 07 We have three mobile operators with unequal market shares—one around 60–65 percent, another around 15–17 percent. Without sharing, the smaller player may fail to expand and could exit. Mandating access to shared infrastructure allows smaller operators to use assets of the larger, for a fair fee—creating revenue for the owner while benefiting consumers.

¶ 08 We will also introduce minimum resilience guidelines—battery backup durations, generator requirements—especially after events like Cyclone “Michaung,” where outages impacted base stations. With shared infrastructure, compliance and resilience improve.

¶ 09 Under Section 17(6)(a) of the Act, two licenses have already been issued for building and maintaining telecom infrastructure, and a third will be issued within two weeks. These companies will invest, build, and operate neutral infrastructure; telecom operators will lease. One such company, EDOTCO, plans to invest about USD 670 million by 2030, bringing in foreign exchange and reducing operators’ forex needs.

¶ 10 Multiple towers also harm urban planning and the environment; shared sites help mitigate this. Permitting for new towers currently involves about 21 approvals; TRCSL’s framework will streamline this.

¶ 11 We will conduct a Significant Market Power (SMP) analysis and develop a cost model to ensure fair pricing of shared infrastructure and prevent abusive charges that would undermine sharing.

¶ 12 These regulations give TRCSL enforcement powers, including sanctions and license actions, to ensure compliance and advance infrastructure sharing, enhance services, and address burning issues in the telecom sector. Thank you.