Telecom Italia on Tuesday called on governments to invest in next-generation network projects.
"There is a trend historically for governments to invest in networks, it's famous in Asia and it's happening in Australia," said Stefano Pileri, CTO of Telecom Italia.
"Governments have to make their contribution and invest in areas where the market will not," he said during a keynote presentation at Broadband World Forum Europe in Paris.
Pileri commented that once governments have invested and next-generation network projects are under way, they should then share the responsibility of promoting their use by both consumers and enterprises.
Conversely he warned that regulators need to take a back seat, and that over-regulation could stifle the rollout of high-speed broadband networks.
"There is a dangerous trend at the moment in Europe that regulators will over-regulate the new network – it's not the right time, there is no rationale for this," said Pileri.
"Whoever can invest, should invest – in a way that is competitive," he added.
He commented that operators are seeing traffic growth but flat revenues, and that only a light regulatory approach will ensure that network providers can reverse this trend.
"Not regulating doesn't mean not open – it just means no regulation on price or [network] architecture. Why can't I decide what technology to rollout?" he asked.
This article originally appeared on Total Telecom