The Ministry of Transport, Posts and Telecommunications and the Telecommunication Office are the principals players in Information Society.

The Ministry of Transport, Posts and Telecommunications (www.telecom.gov.sk) is the central body of the State Administration for the Telecommunication sector. Mr. Jozef Macejko is the Minister. Other Ministries relevant are: the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Culture, the Ministry of Education, and the Ministry of Interior – Information Section.

The Telecommunication Office is an independent regulatory authority which is responsible for executing the State regulation of telecommunication activities. It is also responsible for the execution of international relations in the field of telecommunications at the level of regulatory bodies, for technical and price regulation of telecommunication market and the co-operation with the Council of the Slovak Republic for radio and TV broadcasting in the field of radio and TV broadcasting retransmissions. Chairman of this authority is Mr. Ludovit Hogh.

The Antimonopoly Office, the Government Office, the Statistical Office and Infostat are the main consultative councils to the administration on the telecommunications. The Director of the Statistical Office of the Slovak Republic is Mr. Peter Mach. The Antimonopoly Office is responsible to protect and assure a competitive market. It controls and penalizes the abuse of a dominant market position and any violation of the protection of economic competition.

Slovak Telecom (ST) is the major supplier of telecommunications services in the Slovak Republic. ST is sole supplier of basic voice telephony services and has the exclusive rights to provide this service, until 31 December 2002. Recently, an important privatization, of Slovak Telecom has come into effect in which Deutsche Telecom, one of the world’s leading telecoms players, acquired a 51 % majority stake in Slovak Telecom. The General Director of Slovak Telecom is Mr. Emil Hubinak.

There are two mobile operators in Slovakia, Globtel GSM and Eurotel Bratislava. The Slovak Republic has a 36% stake in Globtel while France Telecom owns 64%. The government has expressed plans to sell its share in an initial public offering. The director of Globtel is Mr. B. Duthoit. (www.globtel.sk).

Eurotel Bratislava (www.eurotel.sk) is owned 51% by Slovak Telecom and 49% by Atlantic West B.V. a joint venture between subsidiaries of Verizon Communications and AT&T Corporation. The director of Eurotel is Mr. Josef Barta.

2.1 Internet Providers

The Slovak Internet Service Provider (ISP) market is consolidating and basically is controlled by foreign investors. The Key players in the Slovak Internet market are:

• Nextra, a subsidiary company of Norwegian Telecoms firm, Telenor, and

• GTS Slovakia, controlled by the financial group Advent International Corporation

• EuroWeb, a subsidiary firm of Dutch KPN Telecom

• Slovak Telecom

Today, more than 200.000 people regularly use the Internet in Slovakia while more than 500.000 people can have access to the Internet if they want to. In April 2000, a General permission for providing Internet access and for providing voice service over Internet (VoIP) was issued by the Ministry of Transport, Posts and Telecommunications. Before this date, it had been possible to provide Internet access only on the basis of an individual license. Provision of voice over Internet had been permitted.

The Research Institute of Post and Telecommunications (VUS), was established in 1993 and is a nation-wide scientific research institution, responsible for the support of State telecommunication policy in the area of legislation, tariffs, frequency management, quality of services, numbering, in the area of technical regulations for type approval of terminal telecommunication and radiocommunication equipment and applied research in traffic management, network structure, private networks. Competent departments of the managerial center regularly update the Internet home site www.vus.sk continually bringing up-to-date information about VUS activities and contacts, including references to other web sites related to the portfolio of VUS services. An Internet site, named "Information Society Slovakia" has been developed and is being administrated by VUS. Its main goal is to support the development of Information Society issues in the country. The site started as a platform for the exchange of information among experts and now operates as a point of contact for companies interested in establishing an Action Plan and for the preparation of a National Strategy of Information Society in Slovakia. This site is working on connecting to the ISPO main site.

Technical universities are co-operating with local IT companies on specific application projects (e.g. Department of Telecommunication of the Slovak Technical University with Slovak Cardiology Center on Tele-medicine, etc.). Specific application projects related to Information Society are managed by the Slovak Technical University in Bratislava, the Zilina’s University (former University of Transport and Communications), the Technical University Kosice, Commenius’s University in Bratislava, Matej Bella’s University in Banska Bystrica, etc. Specific projects are managed also by different institutes of Slovak Academic of Science. Sanet is the Slovak Academic Network.

Five licenses for leased lines have been issued to alternative network operators within Slovakia. These operators are comprised of four energy companies (together making up the consortium group ENERGOTEL) and the subsidiary company of the state-owned Transpetrol (petrol company), TRANSTEL.

Several expert interest associations perform their activities in the Slovak Republic.

• Slovak Electrotechnic Society (voluntary professional association supporting telecommunication activities and systematic distribution of Information to own members and also to the public)

• Slovak Informatics Society (voluntary professional association supporting informatics activities and systematic distribution of Information to own members and also to the public)

• APKT (Association of Cable TV operators)

• SAKT (Slovak Association for the Cable Telecommunications)

• SAEC (Slovak Association for e-Commerce)

• The Association of Telecommunication Users in Slovakia, established in 1997, is a professional protection association of users of telecommunications services and technologies, including Information Technology users.

• Jozef Murgas Foundation has been in existence for 6 years and has occupied an important position in support of young professionals, education, science and propagation in telecommunications.

• ATM Association (establ. In 1997)

• ISDN Association (establ. In 1998)

• API (Association of Internet Access Providers) a non-profit organization was founded in April 1999. API represents Internet service providers in the area of creation of conditions for Internet service development in the Slovak Republic.

• The Voluntary Interest Associations also play an important role in spreading and propagation of expert knowledge and possibilities of new services in the user environment.