Viasat, a satellite operator assisted by & DE BANDT, instituted proceedings before the Brussels Market Court for the annulment of the BIPT’s decision of 29 June 2016 by which the latter granted to Viasat’s competitor an authorisation for the installation and operation of six ground components as part of a system providing mobile satellite services. Viasat claimed, in essence, that the service envisioned by the recipient of the authorisation decision and the system to be deployed to provide such a service do not comply with the European and Belgian regulatory framework on the use of the 2 GHz Band. As a result, in Viasat’s view, the BIPT could not authorise the ground components.
The BIPT’s authorisation decision was annulled a first time by the judgment of the Brussels Market Court of 14 March 2018 due to the BIPT’s failure to state proper reasons. Following this annulment, the BIPT readopted the same decision, with adapted reasons, on 7 August 2018. As a result, Viasat instituted proceedings for the annulment of that second decision.
On 23 January 2019, the Brussels Market Court issued an interlocutory judgment referring two questions to the Court of Justice of the European Union.
In this judgment, the Market Court recalled that, in accordance with the European and Belgian regulatory framework on the use of the 2 GHz Band, the operators selected by the European Commission had committed themselves, in their tenders, to ensuring that their proposed mobile satellite service would cover a service area of at least 60% of the aggregate land area of the Member States, from the time the service commenced, and that said service was to be provided in all Member States, to at least 50% of the population and over at least 60% of the aggregate land area of each Member State, no later than by 13 June 2016. It is undisputed that this commitment has not been met.
In order to render a final judgment, the Brussels Market Court has decided to stay the proceedings and interrogate the Court of Justice on the legal consequences of this violation. In particular, the Brussels Market Court seeks to know whether the European regulatory framework on the use of the 2 GHz Band should be interpreted as meaning that, if a satellite operator selected by the European Commission violates the coverage obligations and the deadline mentioned above, the competent authorities of the Member States must - or, in the alternative, may - refuse to grant authorisations to deploy complementary ground components to that operator.
The case is currently pending before the Court of Justice
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