Network sharing is on the rise as a way to reduce the cost of rolling out new networks, especially to under-populated rural areas with their limited revenue potential. However, there are still plenty of conflicts of interest, especially when schemes are government-driven, and some of these threaten to derail the UK plan for a shared rural mobile network. Incumbent BT has reportedly thrown a last minute spanner in the works of the £1bn government scheme to improve rural coverage. According to the Financial Times newspaper, BT claims that its mobile subsidiary, EE, has superior network coverage to those of its three rivals, and has invested more in coverage – and therefore should be able to charge more for access to its…