In a new development, the European Telecommunications Network Operators' Association (ETNO) has called out big tech companies to pay for their network builds.
This was made known to the public after a statement signed by 16 telco bosses from Europe urged the European to prioritize environmental sustainability.
Newsvot gathered that the statement also called on the European Commission to adopt policies to ensure the tech industry is sustained.
The document says that the policies they are trying to adopt are necessary and argues that better digital infrastructure is necessary to preserve natural resources.
According to what the CEOs are saying, they think that the cost of funding network builds is not equally distributed. With significant tech breakthroughs such as metaverse and 5G being adopted, they think that it is time tech companies fund network builds.
"We believe that the largest traffic generators should make a fair contribution to the sizeable costs they currently impose on European networks," the document signed by the 16 CEOs said.
In addition to what they demanded in the document, the CEOs suggest that streamers should be included.
According to them, steamers paying up could" benefit tech companies, who rely the most on massive network upgrades, as we move to an age of open and connectivity-enabled metaverse."
Similar Document
The document currently released by the 16 CEOs urging for tech and environmental sustainability isn't the only one that has suggested such policies.
From a document released by The European Telecommunications Network Operators' Association (ETNO), they accused big tech companies of being "a villain" in the tech industry.
ETNO wasn't the only association that had called out big tech companies in the past. The GSM Association had also voiced the unequal distribution of costs.
They alleged that big tech companies such as Meta, Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet, Netflix, and Amazon take 57 percent of traffic.
In a statement, they made it clear that the tech industry giants only concentrated on making profits through digital infrastructures provided by carriers.
They pointed out that the tech companies leave carriers with disproportionate capital expenditure, making carriers not have enough profit margins.
Do Big Tech Companies Invest in Network Carriers?
What carriers say is not that the big tech companies haven't invested in them but rather pointing out how tech companies invest in them.
Carriers have stated that tech companies majorly invest in their infrastructure, leaving out networks. Carriers complained that only investing in their infrastructures considerably strains their profit margin.
It is speculated that the European Commission would receive the messages sent by different Carrier associations and act on them immediately. Newsvot reports that European has also agreed with Green Digital Coalition to ensure that tech companies adopt environmental sustainability policies.
The latest letter by the 16 CEOs was from companies such as Swisscom, Telekom Austria Group, United Group, Orange Group, Deutsche Telekom, BT Group, Telia, TIM Group, Telefónica, Vodafone Group, Bouygues Telecom, Proximus Group, Telenor Group, Fastweb, Altice Portugal, and KPN.