The Hindu Business Line : 3G policy tomorrow

The much awaited policy on third generation mobile services will be announced by the Communications Ministry on Friday. The Ministry is also expected to announce the policy for broadband wireless services and also mobile number portability on the same day.

According to sources in the Department of Telecommunications, it has been decided to allow foreign and new players to participate in the auction for 3G spectrum. However, new players will have to pay an entry fee of around Rs 1,600 crore before they can bid. These players will be given a universal access licence, but will not be eligible for 2G spectrum. DoT may also put a rider that new players should have previous experience of running 3G services.

Sources said that each successful bidder shall be given only 5 MHZ of spectrum in each circle. DoT has also fixed the reserve price for each circle. For Mumbai, Delhi and category A States, bidders will have to pay a minimum of Rs 160 crore. For Chennai, Kolkatta and category B States, the reserve price has been pegged at Rs 80 crore and category C States including Bihar, Orissa and North East has a base price of Rs 30 crore each.

Online auction

The policy will also outline the auction process which is likely to be done online.

The e-auction process will be a multi-stage process wherein the lowest bidder will be eliminated. The bidding will continue till the number of operators left is equal to the number of block of spectrum being auctioned. All the bidders will have to match the highest bidder.

The 3G mobile services are expected to bring high speed Internet services on mobile handsets. Consumers will be able to access services like video on demand and other data services on the handset. For mobile operators this technology will enable them to offer better quality services and more efficient utilisation of spectrum.

While spectrum will be given to GSM-based cellular operators in the 2.1 GHz band, for CDMA players DoT is likely to offer capacity in the 800 MHz and 450 Mhz bands.