An interim assessment of competition in the Korean international telephone service market

Telecommunications Policy

Volumn 21, Issue 3, 1997, Pages 265-274

  Ku, Hyeon Mo ^a   Kim, Jae Cheol ^a  

^a Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology   (South Korea)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

COMPETITION; INTERNATIONAL TRADE; PUBLIC POLICY; TELEPHONE;

INTERIM ASSESSMENT; INTERNATIONAL TELEPHONE SERVICE MARKET;

TELECOMMUNICATION SERVICES;

EID: 0031124699     PISSN: 03085961     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1016/S0308-5961(97)00006-2     Document Type: Article

References (14)

1. Kaserman D L and Mayo J W Competition for 800 service. Telecommunications Policy 1991 15(5) 397.
2. The MOC (Ministry of Communication) was reorganized to the MIC in December, 1994.
3. The inefficiency seems to refer to the internal inefficiency of KT rather than that from the monopoly structure.
4. Taylor W E and Taylor L D Post divestiture long-distance competition in the United States. American Economic Review 1993 83 185-189.
5. The remarkable success of the entrant may be explained by the high service prices and a small number of users. According to a comparative study of the standard tariff by KT Research Center (1992), the international service prices were two to four times as expensive as those of the US, Japan and UK. These high prices probably resulted in a high price elasticity. In 1992, only 5% of subscribers used international telephone services, and their average annual expenditure was about US$380. Hence, the 5% savings would be very attractive to the international phone callers, the heavy users.
6. Cho S, Choi B I and Choi S K Restructuring the Korean telecommunications market. Telecommunications Policy 1965 20(5) 357-373.
7. In 1992, two carriers spent a total of $15 million in advertisement, which was larger than the customer saving, $5-6 million, through the rate reduction: Choi, S K 'One year after introducing the competition in international telephone service market-weakness and remedy' Series in Telecommunications Policy Issues and KISDI (1992).
8. KT international service division, Statistics on International Telecommunication Service Market (1994).
9. According to the market survey by KT Research Center in 1992, 62% of respondents answered that there was an improvement in service quality after competition.
10. We use the term 'operational efficiency' as a simple form of productivity. We measure it using two indicators; traffic volume per employees and traffic volume per trunk. The former reflects the operational efficiency in labor, whereas the later reflects the operational efficiency in facility utilization.
11. Majumdar S K Performance in the US telecommunication services industry. Telecommunications Policy 1992 163 335-336.
12. For a detailed discussion of evolution in Korean telecommunications market, see Cho, S, Choi, B I and Choi, S K, op cit Ref 6.
13. Kim J C and Ro T S Current policy issues in the Korean telecommunication industry. Telecommunications Policy 1993 177 487.
14. Ibid., p. 487.