Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad: Difference between revisions

'''Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad''' ({{lang-en|'''Costa Rican Institute of Electricity'''}}) ('''ICE''') is the [[Costa Rica]]n [[Public company|government-run]] [[electricity]] and [[telecommunication]]s services provider. JointlyTogether with the Radiographic Costarricense SA (RACSA) and Compañía Nacional de Fuerza y Luz (CNFL), they form the ICE Group.

ICE was founded on 8 April 1949 by Decree-Law No. 449, after the [[Costa Rican Civil War]] of 1948, in order to solve the problems of power shortages that occurred in Costa Rica in the 1940s. Since 1963, ICE provides telecommunications services throughout the country.

The attempts to reform ICE throughout a set of laws in the years 1999 and 2000 generated a great [[Mass mobilization|social mobilization]]., including the [[2000 Costa Rican protests]]. The ruling party at that time, the [[Social Christian Unity Party]], and the main opposition, [[National Liberation Party (Costa Rica)|National Liberation Party]], agreed to change the institution. Meanwhile, the citizen opposition reached 274 protests in 14days14 days.<ref>{{Cite news |last1=Gangas |first1=P |last2=Retana |first2=J |year=2006 |url=http://www.redalyc.org/articulo.oa?id=30804205 |title=Ciudadanos críticos: Las movilizaciones contra el "Combo ICE" en Costa Rica |language=Spanish |trans-title=Critical Citizens: Demonstrations against "Combo ICE" in Costa Rica |journal=América Latina Hoy |issue=42 |pages=93–108 }}</ref>

Following the [[Dominican Republic–Central America Free Trade Agreement]], the telecommunication market was opened to private companies. Since 2011, [[América Móvil]] through [[Claro Americas]] and [[Telefónica]] through [[Movistar]], are competing against ICE in the Costa Rican mobile market.<ref>{{Cite news|last=Agüero |first=Mercedes R. |date={{Date|6 November 2011-11-06}} |title=Claro rompe monopolio celular al activar sus primeras líneas |language=Spanish |trans-title=Claro breaks mobile telephony monopoly by activating its first line |journal=[[La Nación (San José)|La Nación]] |url=http://www.nacion.com/2011-11-06/ElPais/Claro-rompe-monopolio-celular-al-activar-sus---primeras-lineas.aspx |deadurlurl-status=yesdead |archiveurlarchive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120524195041/http://www.nacion.com/2011-11-06/ElPais/Claro-rompe-monopolio-celular-al-activar-sus---primeras-lineas.aspx |archivedatearchive-date=May 24, 2012 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|last=Agüero |first=Mercedes R. |date={{Date|31 October 2011-11-0}} |title=Movistar no logró abrir todas sus tiendas en primer día de ventas |language=Spanish |trans-title=Movistar failed to open all its stores in its first day of sales |journal=[[La Nación (San José)|La Nación]] |url=http://www.nacion.com/2011-11-09/ElPais/movistar--no-logro-abrir-todas-sus-tiendas-en-primer-dia-de-ventas---.aspx |deadurlurl-status=yesdead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20111214113451/http://www.nacion.com/2011-11-09/ElPais/movistar--no-logro-abrir-todas-sus-tiendas-en-primer-dia-de-ventas---.aspx |archivedatearchive-date=December 14, 2011 }}</ref>

[[Category:EnergyElectric power companies of Costa Rica]]

[[Category:Mobile phoneTelecommunications companies of Costa Rica]]