| Abstract: | This article calls on companies – and governments – in Europe to welcome competition in their markets. Liberalisation of Europe's utility sectors has lagged behind the Single Market generally, to the detriment of consumers and industrial users – except in telecommunications where new technology has forced the pace. The author argues that the potential advantages for incumbents of loss of domestic market dominance are outweighed by the advantages of embracing competition and access to overseas markets: they benefit from the discipline of benchmarking, lessened regulatory pressures and fewer barriers to access to markets abroad. He compares the strategies of Electricité de France and British Telecom to illustrate this. |
