Rational Behaviour starts in UK mobile market

If you study the world's major mobile markets, you will see that all have 2 or 3 major providers*, with a cadenced decrease in market share (leader, No 2 etc) which is the sign of a stable, mature market. All except the UK, which has 4 (5 if you count 3.....) - a sign of heatlthy competition in early stages, but ruinous irrationality 10 years down the line. Cometh the recession, cometh rational behaviour however - France Telecom's Orange and Deutsche Telekom's T-Mobile are merging assets in the UK, as the WSJ reports:

The joint venture would create a clear leader with a combined 30 million customers and about 38% of the market.

O2 and Vodafone Group PLC are currently Nos. 1 and 2, with 27.1% and 23.6% market share by customers, respectively, according to research firm Gartner Inc.

The deal is likely to be looked over by the U.K. Office of Fair Trade, which considers all combinations that would control more than 25% of a market, and possibly the European Commission.

We doubt the OFT will intervene as it can be shown the resultant market is "industry standard". This also puts 3 UK into play - with 7% market share it either claws a No. 2 place for Vodafone or cements O2 into No 2 play, so Hutchison Whampoa can at last get rid of the turke - sorry, valuable strategic asset - without losing face (we have heard many a rumour that 3 is up for sale, even thought it had gone once ). Given todays' trading conditions, we predict a sale within a year at longest.

Whether this is the start of the Mobile Industry Web 2.0 in all its glory is moot. That honour went to the iPhone, which has forced a different sort of rationality onto Planet Mobile...............

* In any one region - some countries have more providers but they tend to have regional fiefdoms.