Terms for the 4G Auction in 2012 altered by UK regulator

By 4G Mobile Broadband

January

18

2012

While an increasing number of countries around the world have had 4G networks in operation for over a year now the UK has not even started building its next generation networks, although it appears that a date will be announced soon for the building of these new networks.

Countries like Japan and the US have been providing services over 4G networks for more than a year now while the UK operators have had to stay with slower 3G networks but now the UK communications regulator Ofcom have advised that the 4G spectrum auction should take place in Q4 of 2012 and that it has created a new set of proposals for the auction.

The unused spectrum running on the 800MHz frequency and the higher frequency 2.6GHz spectrum that will be up for sale in the 4G auction was originally discussed back in 2009 and was set to go up for sale in the first quarter of 2012. Objections by a number of the major network providers regarding the allocation of the spectrum meant that Ofcom were forced to postpone the 4G auction until an agreement could be reached.

The most important considerations faced by Ofcom was to ensure that not only did it raise as much money as possible from the sale of the 4G spectrum but also that it had four strong network operators to promote healthy competition between them all.

The arguments between the major network providers did have one positive outcome for Ofcom and that was to give it chance to review what it required from the future 4G network providers. The type of services that could be offered on the new 4G networks was something that the regulator avoided, although it looks likely that most providers will opt to use LTE technology for its new networks