True, DPC expected to serve subscribers during transition after concessions
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The National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission telecom committee is expected to allow TrueMove and Digital Phone Co (DPC) to cooperate with CAT Telecom to continue serving the companies' combined 17 million users under CAT's 1,800-megahertz c
The final draft of the interim measures to protect their 1,800MHz subscribers, which are expected to be approved by the telecom committee tomorrow, indicates that concession holders and the concession owner would collaborate to provide the interim cellular services to customers.
The NBTC will soon officially assign parties to operate the interim service. The draft requires the parties to propose measures on consumer protection to the commission within 15 days after the draft takes effect. This is changed from 90 days in the previous draft, since the NBTC has only 40 days left before the 1,800MHz concession contracts end on September 15.
The NBTC’s board is due to approve the draft on August 14 and publish it in the Royal Gazette this month.
The present draft also indicates that the interim operators have to pay a telecom licence fee, spectrum fee, numbering fee, universal service obligation fee and leasing services or revenue-sharing fees (if any) to the NBTC.
Last week a group of law lecturers criticised this draft, saying the NBTC had no right to allow any party to continue serving these 17 million subscribers on an interim basis for one year as there is no law to support this practice. They advised that the NBTC should hurry to migrate all these subscribers to other operators instead.
While the draft allows for a one-year interim period of services, the lecturers said there was no guarantee that the NBTC would not further extend the interim service period if there were still some subscribers left in the TrueMove-DPC networks after the one-year interim period.
The NBTC’s telecom committee last week announced that it planned to auction the 1,800MHz spectrum in September next year. It has already hired the International Telecommunication Union to design the auction model and pricing.
The NBTC is considering whether to auction the 17.5MHz range of the 900MHz spectrum of Advanced Info Service’s concession contract, which is due to expire in 2015, together with the 25MHz range of the 1,800MHz in September 2014.
