The National ICT Regulatory Agency authorized one more company – Norma SRL – to operate Internet networks installed at Moldova's western border, in Ungheni, the Agency said in a press release, quoted by Info-Prim Neo. Norma is the third company to be licensed this year to carry out such activities after Orange Moldova and Starnet acquired such licenses in April. At the same time, the Agency authorized Orange Moldova to operate a second network at the western border, in the district of Cahul. The Agency has argued the access of new operators to upstream networks will stimulate competition on this segment of the market and consequently reduce rates and improve services for broadband Internet access. Until this year only the public operator Moldtelecom had such a license. In the first quarter of this year, the number of broadband Internet users rose by 60.7 percent, from the similar period last year, to 217,000, as the number of 3G mobile Internet users reached 96,000.