As regulators start to consider their 5G auctions, there is a danger that they will stick to the same old approaches – rigid, long term licences allocated by auction; prioritizing revenue for the Treasury over lowering barriers to entry. If that happens, there is the risk that 5G, in its narrow definition, will increasingly support an ageing business model while new, more disruptive service providers will seize the opportunity to build their own flexible, shared, software-driven networks in unlicensed spectrum. These issues are being debated in many countries which want to be in the first wave of 5G deployment. Hong Kong is one, and there, the operators are critical of regulator OFCA’s “archaic mobile spectrum principles and practices”. The MNOs…