By Kiran Rathee
Copyright indiatimes
New Delhi: The telecom regulator has commenced the exercise for the next round of spectrum auction through which the government aims to sell airwaves in nearly 10 bands, including the upper 6 GHz band, which will be sold for the first time. As the majority of airwaves remained unsold in the past two auctions, the regulator wants to deliberate ways to make the process more lucrative for prospective buyers, which may also include firms that are not licensed telecom operators. To enhance competition and mitigate over-supply, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) is set to discuss with stakeholders if there is a need to review the spectrum auction method and design. The regulator has come up with a consultation paper, comprising 44 questions related to pricing and other modalities of the auction. All the stakeholders can submit their views to the paper by October 28. As per Trai, the upcoming auction involves existing bands of 800 MHz, 900 MHz, 1800 MHz, 2100 MHz, 2300 MHz, 2500 MHz, 3300 MHz, 26 GHz. These bands are already in use for international mobile telecommunications (IMT) in India. The other bands under consideration including the 600 MHz band, 1427-1518 MHz, 6425-6725 MHz and 7025-7125 MHz bands are yet to be assigned to telecom service providers for IMT in India. The new bands will be auctioned for the first time. The last auction, conducted in June 2024, was not a great success. The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) had put 10,522.35 MHz of spectrum worth Rs 96,238.45 crore at reserve price to auction, out of which 141.40 MHz was sold with bids amounting to Rs 11,340.79 crore. Live EventsIn fact, as per an analysis done by the DoT’s wireless advisor, spectrum worth Rs 17.23 lakh crore (at reserve price) was put under auction from 2010-2024 but the government managed to sell worth only Rs 5.64 lakh crore, leaving airwaves worth nearly Rs 11.6 lakh crore unsold, an overall revenue efficiency of 32.7%. The Department of Economic Affairs (DEA), while approving the auction results for the 2024 sale, had observed the following, among others: “Examine the demand & supply dynamics and explore the possibility of enhancing competition and mitigating over-supply.” The regulator will be considering the views of DEA while deliberating the upcoming sale with stakeholders. As per Trai, currently, only access service providers are permitted to take part in the auctions for IMT spectrum. “Prima facie, one of the methods for enhancing competition in the spectrum auction could be by way of allowing other types of service providers (apart from access service providers) – which also might require IMT spectrum – to participate in the auction for IMT spectrum,” Trai said in the paper. Another method, the regulator said, could be to establish an enabling regulatory framework for reducing entry barriers for access service providers so that new entities may also consider obtaining access service license/ authorisation and participate in the auction for IMT spectrum. Regarding reserve price, Trai said the demand for spectrum is influenced by a range of technical and economic factors and the reserve price also acts as one of the factors that influence demand for spectrum. The reserve price that is set too high may discourage participation and limit competition. At the same time, the reserve price should not be set too low. “What additional economic, technical, or market-related factors should be taken into account while determining the valuation and, subsequently, the reserve price of spectrum, in order to promote effective competition, ensure optimal spectrum utilization, and encourage wider participation in auctions, Trai questioned. The Authority also intends to examine whether there is a need to modify or revise the methodologies currently adopted in the spectrum valuation models. “Such revision may involve consideration of additional factors, revision of the representative band (currently 1800 MHz), or inclusion of technology-specific parameters,” Trai added.Add as a Reliable and Trusted News Source Add Now!
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(You can now subscribe to our Economic Times WhatsApp channel)Read More News onspectrum auctiontelecom regulatorspectrum bandsTrai consultation paperspectrum pricingRevenueDemandtelecom regulatory authority of indiadepartment of telecommunicationsdepartment of economic affairs(Catch all the Business News, Breaking News, Budget 2025 Events and Latest News Updates on The Economic Times.) Subscribe to The Economic Times Prime and read the ET ePaper online….moreless
