The mobile communications industries of 10 European countries now have a body to lobby for their joint interests, in the shape of the newly-established Federation of Radio Communication Associations of Europe – FRE. The associations already affiliated are the UK, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, the Netherlands, Norway, Iceland, Germany and Portugal, but it is expected that more countries will join – Spain, Italy and Switzerland are in particularly active discussion. The Federation has been formed to push for common European regulations, as well as promoting the more general interests of the industries in each of the member countries. The member organisations have already had preparatory meetings in Copenhagen, London and Geneva, and will hold their first fully-fledged meeting in Brussels later this month. One of the first issues that it will tackle is the development of the GSM Groupe Speciale Mobile European cellular radio standard, and how this will be implemented. The Federation will try to ensure that installation of network infrastructures presses ahead as quickly as possible, though it will not be involved in member countries’ marketing of the services – the reluctance of Cellnet Mobile Communications Ltd and Vodafone Group Plc in the UK to push GSM is not in conflict with the aims of the new Federation as long it does not hold up network installation. Indeed, the scope of issues that the Federation will tackle is relatively small, since it will get involved only in areas where all countries are in agreement: according to James Malcolm, chief executive of the UK’s Federation of Communication Services, we are going to focus on common interest and leave alone the areas where we have different priorities. He also commented that not all of the member countries are playing the same active role in the European Federation; he singled out Germany in particular as being a member more or less in name only, since its lack of liberalisation means it is not in a position to get as involved as the better Europeans.
