The Ministry of Communication aim: enabling IBC to provide Internet services to private and medium-sized customers

The Ministry of Communications has issued a hearing aimed at enabling IBC to provide Internet services to private and medium-sized business customers. Today, the company operates in a supplier-supplier format, which is a wholesale company only, and cannot directly market its services to end-users, except for large business customers. In the firm's estimation, in order to enable IBC to become established in the market and to compete with competing media groups, it is necessary to expand the company's format in its early years.
The firm is considering authorizing the company to market "reverse Bendel" packages that include infrastructure and an Internet provider, similar to those that Bezeq currently markets, in order not to be completely dependent on access providers in developing its customer base. The approval will be granted for a period not exceeding five years or 400,000 customers, whichever comes first. The customer will be the one who chooses the access provider according to his or her considerations.
IBC is currently allowed to provide Internet services to a large business customer - a body whose annual revenue is at least NIS 30 million. The office is considering allowing the company a retail entrance to the medium business sector as well. A medium-sized business is defined as having a licensed dealership certificate and the annual average of its monthly accounts with the company from the date of joining the service is expected to be at least NIS 2,000 without VAT.
IBC was established in July 2013 as a third Internet infrastructure company alongside Bezeq and HOT, with the aim of promoting competition that will lead to improved communications infrastructure in Israel. The company has started to build on fiber-optic network, which can provide ultra-fast internet up to 1 gigabyte. The venture was unsuccessful in its early years and ran into financial problems and last year was acquired by Cellcom and the 5770 Fund in a partnership of 70%, with 30% remaining in the power company's possession. The Ministry of Communications has approved the company only 40% deployment within a decade.