DSI finds no evidence yet of legal problems with 2.1GHz auction

Tarit Pengdith, director-general of the DSI, said yesterday that the agency expected to complete its scrutiny next week, pending examination of more information from the telecom regulator on seven issues.
The DSI has asked the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission for the information on these issues and the watchdog is expected to provide it this week.
The NBTC took the initiative in October to submit to four state authorities, including the DSI, documents related to its auction of the 2.1-gigahertz spectrum to show that it is willing to have them scrutinise the legitimacy of its auction process.
The DSI has focused its search on possible breaches of the State Procurement Act.
The seven issues raised by the DSI include the criteria that the NBTC used in deciding not to apply the e-auction method, the criteria for permitting each bidder to grab a maximum of three spectrum slots out of the nine slots available in the auction, and the criteria for setting the reserve price at Bt4.5 billion per slot instead of the fair market price of Bt6.44 billion.
The other issues are the criteria for fixing the deposit that the companies had to place when applying for the spectrum licences at Bt1.35 billion and whether this high deposit was intended to create a barrier to entry for any small applicants, the auction regulations and names of all potential applicants, and the apparent lack of competition during the auction.
Regarding the apparent lack of competition, the DSI has asked the NBTC why in the end only three bidders took part and, because of that, why the NBTC did not abort the auction by exercising the final clause in the appendix of the auction regulations.
The clause says that if needed, the NBTC could change the auction rules or even call off the auction.
The NBTC’s telecom committee has yet to grant the spectrum licences to the three bid winners, pending a decision by the Central Administrative Court on whether to issue an injunction against the licensing.
The three companies that won bandwidth slots plan to use them to provide third-generation cellular service.
The court has already questioned the Ombudsman, the bid winners and the telecom committee on whether the auction was staged under free and fair competition, as requested by the Ombudsman, which also sought a court injunction.
The telecom committee held the 2.1GHz spectrum auction on October 16 and sanctioned the results two days later. By the auction terms, the watchdog has to award the licences to the bid winners within 90 days of the endorsement.
The telecom committee’s panel assigned to look into a possible conspiracy among the three bid winners has already concluded that there was none. It will submit the probe result to the NBTC tomorrow.
Recently, NBTC secretary-general Takorn Tantasit said that if there is no court order halting the licensing and if the NBTC’s panel does not find an evidence of fraud, the telecom committee would go ahead and grant the licences to the three bid winners.
They are Advanced Wireless Network of Advanced Info Service, DTAC Network of Total Access Communication and Real Future of True Corp.