Council says NBTC can hold auctions

Council says NBTC can hold auctions

The existing board of the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) has the authority to hold the planned auctions of the 1800- and 850-megahertz spectra, according to the Council of State.

The decision came on Wednesday in response to a letter the NBTC submitted to the Council of State last December asking whether the existing board had the authority to hold the auctions.

The existing NBTC board is now working as the acting NBTC after its six-year working term expired in October 2017.

The suggestion by the Council of State is to set an agenda for the NBTC board meeting on April 11 for consideration, according to NBTC secretary-general Takorn Tantasith.

The 1800- and 850MHz spectrum ranges are now operated by Total Access Communication (DTAC) under concessions of state-owned enterprise CAT Telecom. The concession expire on Sept 30.

The NBTC plans to auction 10MHz of bandwidth on the 850MHz spectrum and 90MHz of bandwidth on the 1800MHz spectrum this year.

The original draft of the planned auctions was approved by the NBTC's board in December, and a public hearing on the draft was held the same month.

Under the original timeline, the NBTC would hold the auctions in June and award licences to winners by July, or two months ahead of the expiry date of DTAC's 1800- and 850MHz concessions, in order to avoid service disruption after the concessions expire.

The original auction draft for the 1800MHz spectrum was for 90MHz of bandwidth divided into three slots or licences of 30MHz each.

The reserve price would be set at 37.45 billion baht (for 30MHz of bandwidth).

But the NBTC office in January decided to revise the planned auction's conditions by dividing the 90MHz into nine slots of 10MHz instead.

The reserve price for each 10MHz slot would be reduced to 12.4 billion baht.

The change came after a public hearing on the draft in December that featured calls for more competition and opinions proposed by telecom operators at the hearing.

However, the amended conditions of the 1800MHz auction draft have yet to be approved by the existing NBTC board.

Mr Takorn said the NBTC board aims to consider the amended draft of the 1800MHz auction at the April 11 meeting.

Previously, Mr Takorn had told the Bangkok Post that he believed the existing board wouldn't be pushing the planned auction.

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