AMTA wants 120MHz of 'Digital Dividend' spectrum

Stuart Corner
Thursday, 30 April 2009 07:53

IT Industry - Strategy

He said mobile operators needed certainty about retention of their existing spectrum allocations and access to the 2.6GHz band  in addition to a substantial allocation from the Digital Dividend.

“The mobile telecommunications industry needs access to sufficient spectrum to ensure the deployment of new and competitive mobile broadband technologies, such as Long-Term Evolution (LTE), will not be delayed into the Australian market. It is critical that network owners have sufficient lead time to secure the capital for investment in spectrum. If the industry fails to get sufficient spectrum there will be fewer services on offer, potential service delays and disruptions."

The Government is already gearing up to address the existing spectrum allocations for mobile services - the 15 year licences underpinning all current services expire in 2013.

The Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy has issued a discussion paper on possible public interest criteria for the re-issue of 15 year radiofrequency spectrum licences. It is canvassing input on whether 15 year spectrum licences should be reallocated through a price based method, such as auction, or renewed. This includes licences in the 800MHz, 1800MHz, 2.1GHz, 2.3GHz and 3.4GHz spectrum bands - included in these bands is the spectrum in which all Australia's cellphone services operate.

Information gathered through the consultation process will be used to develop policy advice to the minister. Announcing the consultation, communications minister, Stephen Conroy said: "While key licences do not begin expiring until 2013, spectrum licence re-issue requires major Government policy decisions. There are complex issues that will take some time to assess but work has already begun and I expect that the Government will be making decisions over the next 12 months on this important matter."

The Department has already issued a tender to engage consultants to value the fifteen year mobile spectrum licences. The Department requires a consultant to conduct a desktop analysis to estimate the potential value that could be received from re-issue of the licences. A range of scenarios will be provided to the successful tenderer ranging from the reallocation of licences by auction to the renewal of licences held by incumbents.

According to David Havyatt, currently head of regulatory with Unwired, but writing in a personal capacity on his blog, the consultant's task will not be an easy one. "There is a particular problem inherent in the whole construction of spectrum policy and the idea of value. As the tender document also notes: 'Spectrum is a valuable resource. The Radiocommunications Act 1992 aims to provide for management of the radiofrequency spectrum in order to, among other things, maximise the overall public benefit derived from using the radiofrequency spectrum. The Government is required to balance a range of social policy objectives against industry demand to achieve this outcome.
"The question always arises of how the 'overall public benefit' from using radiofrequency spectrum is interpreted. In an environment' limited to the income generated by the sale of the spectrum licence, or is it something greater that would be recognised as the social benefit in a more standard cost-benefit analysis."