Position Papers

Connect Europe's position papers represent the views of its member companies on a wide range of technical, regulatory, and trade issues. These papers are directed at European Union decision-makers, national governments, and the general public.

Position papers are developed either internally by our working groups or, occasionally, in cooperation with third parties such as other industry associations at the European and national levels. This section also includes materials from our previous association, ETNO.

07 Oct, 2021

ETNO response to the European Commission public consultation on the revision of the Horizontal Block Exemption Regulations and Guidelines

The response to this consultation is available here.
Additional views on network sharing are available here.

24 Sep, 2021

Cyber Security Rating – a rising challenge for EU industries

The financial crash that occurred in the United States in 1837 prompted the need for risk assessment for investors. The power of financial rating agencies in influencing investors has grown in importance over the past decades, due to a number of significant events (the collapse of Enron in the US; the US Subprime mortgage crisis; the late 2000 financial crisis; and the Greek national debt crisis). Following increased complaints and impact of such agencies, this has led to the creation in Europe of the European Securities and Markets Authorities (ESMA).

24 Sep, 2021

ETNO response to the Call for feedback by the Platform on Sustainable Finance on the draft report on preliminary recommendations for technical screening criteria for the EU taxonomy

The European Telecommunication Network Operators' Association (ETNO) welcomes the ongoing work by the Platform on sustainable finance and its relevant role in providing advice on the further development of the EU taxonomy. We thus appreciate the opportunity to provide feedback on the draft report on preliminary recommendations for technical screening criteria.

03 Sep, 2021

ETNO comments to the Public Consultation on the Data Act

ETNO welcomes the opportunity to comment on the measures being explored by the European Commission in preparing the Data Act. This document complements our response to the public consultation questionnaire with regards to the two specific sections on business-to-government data sharing for the public interest and on business-to-business data sharing, building on our recent feedback to the Commission’s Inception Impact Assessment (IIA) on the Data Act.

03 Sep, 2021

ETNO comments to the Draft RSPG Opinion on the role of radio spectrum policy to help combat climate change

The European Telecommunication Network Operators' Association (ETNO) welcomes the opportunity to provide feedback to the Draft RSPG Opinion on the role of radio spectrum policy to help combat climate change.

We also positively acknowledge that many of our comments provided in the response to the RSPG Questionnaire[1] were taken into account in the RSPG report on the role of radio spectrum policy to help combat climate change, published in June 2021[2].

31 Aug, 2021

ETNO response to the Public Consultation on the Preliminary Report on the Sector Inquiry into Consumer Internet Of Things

ETNO welcomes the European Commission’s (EC) aim to get a comprehensive understanding of the consumer Internet of Things (IoT) sector, and to assess whether competition in this sector may be restricted or distorted within the internal market.

17 Aug, 2021

ETNO response to the Commission’s public consultation on ‘’Designing mobile phones and tablets to be sustainable – ecodesign’’

ETNO welcomes the European Commission’s (EC) initiative to look into two new initiatives aimed to make mobile phones and tablets more energy efficient and to improve their material efficiency.
European telecommunication companies have high ambitions to include sustainability and circular economy measures as essential core elements into their business.

26 Jul, 2021

ETNO response to BEREC Report on COVID-19 crisis – lessons learned regarding communications networks and services for a resilient society

ETNO welcomes the initiative of BEREC to undergo a stock-take of the lessons learned regarding communications networks and services for a resilient society, including the response of the NRAs.The global COVID-19 crisis once more shed light on the importance of strong and reliable connectivity among societal and business communities. The COVID-19 crisis showed that telecom networks witnessed an increase in internet traffic, as entire societies moved to remote working, but ISPs have coped extremely well with the increase in internet traffic and they avoided networks congestions.