New Zealand is the latest country to set out rules for an upcoming 4G auction, which will take place at the end of October. It will sell 700MHz licences, with nine lots of 2x5MHz on offer, for a reserve price of NZ$22m.
The government has spent $157m clearing the 700MHz band to allow the spectrum to be used for mobile networks. Bidders will initially be limited to buying no more than three lots each though that may increase to four if some lots are left unsold after the first round.
“In setting the reserve price, we have balanced generating a fair return on the sale of the spectrum rights with the significant investment required by mobile network operators to build the 4G network infrastructure,” said ICT minister Amy Adams. ‘The reserve price also takes into account the value to New Zealand of having 4G connectivity widely deployed.”
Licence conditions will include requirements for cellcos to upgrade their existing rural sites to LTE within five years; to build a certain number of cells in currently unserved areas; and to reach given overall coverage targets. Carriers which gain three lots must commit to deploying at least five brand new cell sites per year, for five years, and that figure rises to 10 sites a year for operators with four lots.
There will be preferential terms for new entrants to encourage competition in a rather stagnant market ‘ notably, implementation requirements will be less stringent. New players will have five years to cover at least 50% of the population, while existing cellcos will have to upgrade at least 75% of their current rural 2G and 3G base stations to 4G within five years, to a maximum of 300 sites.
Meanwhile, Slovakian regulator TUSR is accepting online bids in its multiband 4G auction, for spectrum in the 800MHz, 1.8GHz and 2.6GHz bands. Bidding will run until October 7 and any winner must commit to covering at least 50% of the population with LTE by the end of 2018.
The identities of the bidders will not be revealed until the process ends, but the eastern European country’s three existing cellcos ‘ Orange, Slovak Telekom and Telefonica O2 ‘ all expressed interesting in participating during the consultation round, as did triple play provider Slovanet, broadcaster Towercom and telecoms holding firm VelaTel Global Communications. PPF, a major private equity firm in the central and eastern Europe regions, is also reported to be interested in entering both the Slovakian and Czech 4G markets (the latter will be re-running its failed LTE spectrum sale later this year). TUSR is expected to reserve some 1.8GHz spectrum for a new entrant to increase competition.
Bidding has also begun in Taiwan’s LTE spectrum sale, with seven companies approved to take part in a process that may last for a month. The four 3G operators ‘ Chunghwa Telecom, Taiwan Mobile, Far EasTone and Asia Pacific Telecom ‘ are expected to bid alongside Foxconn subsidiary Ambit Microsystems; a new mobile firm set up by the Ting Hsin International Group; and another new company set up by the Shinkong Group.
In total, the government is offering 270MHz of spectrum in the 700MHz, 900MHz and 1.8GHz bands, and even if all of them just reach their reserve price, it will raise TWD35.9bn ($1.2bn).
Finally, in South Korea’s latest auction, KT has gained additional 1.8GHz capacity adjacent to its existing LTE band, paying KRW900bn ($513m) for an extra 15MHz. On the back of this, KT has confirmed plans to emulate its rivals SK Telecom and LG U+ and start to deploy some features of the LTE-Advanced standards, notably carrier aggregation.
SK Telecom also gained additional spectrum ‘ 35MHz in the 1.8GHz band, for which it bid KRW1.05 trillion, though it will only pay KRW400bn as it has handed back some unspecified spectrum to the regulator. The smallest cellco, LG U+, gained 40MHz in the 2.6GHz band.