Public consultation on the draft BEREC Report on the IP Interconnection ecosystem

During the 59th BEREC plenary meeting (6 June 2024), the Board of Regulators approved the Draft BEREC Report on the IP interconnection ecosystem (BoR (24) 93) for public consultation.

This updated report contributes to the ongoing debate on IP interconnection (IP-IC), building on BEREC's previous reports on IP-IC within the context of Net Neutrality published in 2012 and 2017. In this report, BEREC re-evaluates its 2017 conclusions and assesses the current status of IP-IC in Europe.

The report provides insights into the utilisation of various IP-IC services. It analyses traffic developments as well as assesses pricing and cost trends showing that competition and technological progress continue to exert downward pressure on these trends. The report identifies that usage of on-net CDNs and bilateral peering accelerated since BEREC’s report 2017. Furthermore, it explores the economic rationale for Content and Application Providers (CAPs) to deploy their own infrastructures and also reflects on the substitutability between transit and peering.

While the IP-IC ecosystem continues to be driven by effective market dynamics and the cooperative behaviour of market players, the report also shows that a few IP-IC disputes have occurred since 2017. BEREC’s workshops conducted in the context of this project underpinned this finding. The report carves out the generic structure of such disputes. It also takes a closer look at the bargaining situation between CAPs and internet access service providers. Finally, the report addresses the interplay between the Open Internet Regulation (EU) 2015/2120 (OIR) and IP-IC.

Based on the findings of this report, BEREC’s previous observation that the developments in the IP-IC ecosystem are an "evolution rather than a revolution" still holds.

BEREC invites all stakeholders to submit their observations and contributions regarding the draft BEREC Report on the IP Interconnection ecosystem. The purpose of this public consultation is to provide BEREC with feedback from stakeholders and to increase transparency in BEREC’s work.

In accordance with the BEREC policy on public consultations, BEREC will publish a summary of all received contributions, respecting confidentiality requests. All contributions will be published on the BEREC website, taking into account requests for confidentiality and publication of personal data. Stakeholders can request confidentiality of all or part of the documents submitted to the public consultation, upon submission. If there is no clear indication that all or part of the documents are confidential, BEREC will presume that the documents can be made publicly available. Please note that it is also possible to submit both a confidential and a public version of a given contribution.

All stakeholders are invited to submit their contributions by 26 July 2024, 17:00 (CEST) to the following email address:

[email protected] .

Contributions should preferably be submitted in English. Please ensure that the overall size of the email (including attachments) is not larger than 2 MB. Upon submitting the contribution via email, an automatic confirmation reply will be generated. If this confirmation email is not received, the submission of the contribution was not successful and should be sent again. 

We strongly encourage all stakeholders to submit their contributions as early as possible. Contributions received after the above-mentioned deadline will not be considered.

For further information regarding Open Internet rules in the EU, please visit the BEREC website’s dedicated page on the topic at https://berec.europa.eu/eng/open_internet/.