DTAC’s 1,800MHz holding ‘will not be sold off before 2018’

NBTC secretary-general Takorn Tantasith said yesterday that if it were to plan such an auction before the expiration date, DTAC might rush to transfer its customers using that band to other networks, and this would affect the state’s concession revenue.

“Moreover, the NBTC commissioners’ terms will end in 2017. |It’s not appropriate to call for bids on the spectrum in advance,” he said. 

He said it would be much more appropriate to auction bandwidth on 2.6-gigahertz first, given that MCOT is willing to hand over half of the 144MHz it holds on that spectrum to the NBTC.

The regulator will convene with Deputy Prime Minister Prajin Juntong, who is in charge of policy on information and communications technology, early next |year to discuss whether relevant laws should be amended to allow |payment of compensation to the state telecom agencies that return their spectra to the NBTC.

Regarding CAT Telecom’s plan to hold on to its unused 1,800MHz bandwidth until 2025, Takorn said the NBTC had authorised CAT to use the band only until 2018 when the DTAC concession ends. 

“If the state agency can prove that the bandwidth is not under concession and can be used until 2025, we’ll consider again whether to grant its request on the matter,” he said.

The now-defunct Spectrum Allocation Panel assigned 75MHz of bandwidth on the 1,800MHz spectrum to CAT, which then |allocated most of it to private |concession holders, including DTAC. 

DTAC currently uses 25MHz of the bandwidth under the CAT concession, and CAT has tried to get the NBTC to recognise that the remaining idle 20MHz is not under the concession.