April 30 (Reuters) - Mexico's Congress on Tuesday approved a major reform bill that aims to loosen billionaire Carlos Slim's hold on the telecommunications market and curb top broadcaster Televisa's dominance over the airwaves. The following are key points in the reform: * Changes the constitution to create an independent telecommunications and broadcast regulator, the Federal Telecommunications Institute (Ifetel), that will have certain powers such as awarding spectrum auctions that are currently reserved for the Communications Ministry. * The new regulator would have wide powers and could designate firms as dominant, impose stiffer penalties and even break up companies to improve competition. * Establishes a specialized court system to oversee all competition, telecoms and media rulings. Slim's America Movil has been able to avoid decrees and fines from the current regulator through court actions. * Companies that are fined or told to sell off assets by the new federal competition commission would have the right to lodge appeals to suspend these decisions, a tactic companies have used to fight competition rulings. However, Televisa and America Movil will be subject to Ifetel, not the federal competition commission, hampering efforts to contest regulatory rulings. * Removes limits on foreign ownership of telecommunications, eliminating current limits on fixed-line assets. The plan envisages allowing foreign investors to take up to 49 percent ownership of TV or radio broadcasters, pending a review by a foreign investment commission. * Establishes the definition of a predominant player as any firm that controls more than 50 percent of its market. The limit would open both Slim's companies and Televisa to harsher regulations and even asset divestitures. * Slim's mobile firm America Movil and its fixed-line unit Telmex could be deemed predominant players in their markets and be subject to so-called asymmetric regulations. This could allow smaller competitors cheaper connection rates while making Slim's firms pay smaller rivals more to use their networks. * Require local-loop unbundling from predominant players in the telecoms and pay TV and internet markets. This would, for example, require Slim's Telmex to let other players use its connection to phone subscribers to offer TV, phone and internet services. * Require spectrum auctions to create two more national TV networks based on maximizing competition and social demands, not based on who is the highest bidder. Televisa, which has nearly two-thirds of the broadcast audience, and its smaller rival TV Azteca would be barred from participating in the auctions under the new rules. * Impose must-offer/must-carry rules that require broadcasters to offer channels to pay TV carriers while making them carry free-to-air channels. Predominant players in the cable market would have to pay smaller broadcasters for their content. * The bill seeks to foment competition simultaneously in both television and telecoms and could open the door for Slim to enter the domestic TV market. (Reporting by Michael O'Boyle; editing by Jim Marshall)
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