Telecom Lead Asia: Anne Bouverot, director general, GSMA, has urged the telecom ministry to lower the spectrum fee for 1800, 900 and 800 MHz spectrum being auctioned in India.
Anne Bouverot, director general, GSMA, said: “The absence of bidders for the 1800 and 900MHz and a lone bidder in 800MHz for the spectrum auction earlier this month, which includes frequencies that remained unsold from the November 2012 auction, is a clear signal that mobile operators are not willing to pay unreasonably high prices for spectrum.”
During the November 2012 and March 2013 spectrum auctions, the telecom ministry could not achieve its set targets.
Recently, Telecommunications Minister Kapil Sibal told Economic Times that inter-operator rivalries are harming the telecom industry and preventing it from availing the liberal policies put in place by the government to address problems plaguing the sector.
“The industry by its own actions has brought itself to this situation. We are trying to facilitate the process by putting long-term policies in place. We have liberalised in every possible way and trying our best to give hope to operators. But we are caught in a bind. The private operators think only in terms of their own interests. Problems are being created due to corporate rivalries,” Sibal added.
In the wake of poor response from the market, GSMA reiterates its call to the Indian Government not to use spectrum as a means to raise short-term revenues and instead to significantly reduce the proposed reserve prices for the upcoming auction.
“Focus should be on the longer term and creating a healthy business environment where the mobile industry can invest with confidence,” Bouverot added.
GSMA in a statement said that unreasonably high reserve prices lead to spectrum remaining unsold, delays in the delivery of mobile services and ultimately, an increase in consumer tariffs.
According to a recent GSMA study, a 10 per cent expansion in mobile penetration increases productivity by 4.2 percentage points. These benefits will be particularly felt in a country like India, which has a significant and largely unconnected rural population.
Meanwhile, Indian Government is likely to finalise the framework for Unified Licence (UL) shortly. According to UL guidelines, telecom companies holding the licence will be able to provide all services that existing licences permit as well as share spectrum and other active part of telecom infrastructure that were not permitted earlier.
