Government goes to market for alternative broadband licences bidders

[Arch_Angel]

THE Spectrum Management Authority (SMA) will find out if anyone is interested in buying alternative wireless broadband licences within three weeks.

Apart from pushing for deeper broadband penetration, the Government is chasing after $6.4 billion in revenue that it had planned to get this fiscal year from miscellaneous receipts by the Ministry of Science, Technology, Energy and Mining (MSTEM).

But it is facing a shortfall. Plans to sell two 700 megahertz (MHz) band licences, which allow for the provision of 4G technology, fizzled late last month as none of the 24 persons from 10 countries showing interest bid on them (priced at a minimum of US$40 million and US$45 million, respectively).

"This does not mean that our quest to improve competition and to attract a new player into the sector is over," said telecommunications minister Phillip Paulwell in his address to the Jamaica Computer Society Lifetime Achievement Awards. "We recognise that spectrum is a valuable national resource and if the time is not right to allocate 700 MHz frequency, there will be another opportunity."

Read more: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/busin...#ixzz2kWfrmpfj

[talawahdotnet]

Hmm, sound like budget pressure driving this more than market demand...

[danthony]

i hardly think anybody gonna want to setup shop here. claro's failed experiment can be used as example for other players to see that with FLOW, LIME, DIGICEL already here, the market is saturated. jamaican's cant afford another cell phone, n the few person's who would switch possibly wont be enough to make a profit in the medium term....

[talawahdotnet]

There might still be room for someone like Dekal wireless or another broadband player to go after a high speed wireless data niche without trying to compete in the cell phone market.