Yes: of course this benefits large, incumbent service providers.
Smaller providers will find it difficult to compete now that they are obliged to offer the same level of service, at the same cost, to people travelling throughout the EU.
This ultimately excludes the possibility of cheaper local services: I find it a surprising move from the EU who should act to prevent anti-competitive practices.
There's nothing saying that they have to provide coverage, just the same price.
A new upstart has Hobson's choice between:
- being price-fixed locally by Vodafone's pan-European wholesale prices and therefore being unable to compete effectively.
or: - forbidding customers roaming coverage and therefore being unable to compete effectively.
Btw, whenever I travel within EU one of the first things I do after landing would be to get a PrePay card. In European countries PrePay offers are really good and sometimes better than PostPay contracts.
If anything, I fear that this will favour an oligopoly of the big ones, like Vodafone and Orange, with no real benefit to me, a user accustomed with searching for good local PrePay offers.