Iliad’s Free Mobile will begin phasing out the use of Orange’s network for domestic roaming from January 2017, following the introduction of stricter guidelines by French regulator Arcep over such agreements.

The move marks the “progressive reduction and end of the national roaming agreement between the two operators”, said Orange in a statement, with the contract for 2G/3G roaming set to cease at the end of 2020.

Free Mobile has relied on market leader Orange for national roaming since launching its services in 2012, and the agreement is seen as enabling the newcomer to become a disruptive force in the country’s mobile market.

The changes come as watchdog Arcep set French operators a three week deadline in May to submit changes to their existing network sharing and roaming deals, with Free Mobile/Orange’s agreement coming under scrutiny, along with a similar agreement between rivals Bouygues Telecom and SFR.

It is thought that while Arcep considers such network roaming to be beneficial, it also must be transitory or limited in scale, with the side effect being that it removes a newcomer’s incentive to invest in their own infrastructure.

In its own statement announcing the addendum to the contract, Iliad pointed to the fact that Free Mobile “has invested massively in the rollout of its network, and now covers 84.5 per cent of the French population for 3G and 68.3 per cent for 4G”.

Arcep also previously proposed its own end date to Free Mobile’s roaming deal with Orange, suggesting that 3G should finish between end-2018 and end-2020, while 2G roaming should cease by the end of 2022.