Taiwan Star Telecom and Asia Pacific Telecom have been issued 5G licenses, bringing the total number of licensed local 5G operators to five, Taiwan’s National Communications Commission (NCC) said..
Chunghwa Telecom, Far EasTone Telecommunications and Taiwan Mobile had secured 5G licenses last month and launched commercial 5G services in July.
After obtaining its 5G license, Taiwan Star said that it plans to launch 5G services next week, while Asia Pacific Telecom said its commercial 5G offering would begin by the end of the third quarter, the Taipei Times reported.
Taiwan’s five mobile operators acquired 5G spectrum in an auction held in January, after paying a combined NT$138.08 billion ($4.68 billion).
Taiwan Star, which paid NT$19.708 billion for 40 megahertz in the 3.5 GHz band, said that it is currently in process to deploy 5G base stations in 455 business districts and other areas in preparation for its 5G launch.
Taiwan Star aims to have a total of 1,000 base stations by the end of the year, mostly in Taiwan’s six special municipalities, according to the report.
Meanwhile, Asia Pacific Telecom, which had obtained 400 megahertz in the 28 GHz band for NT$412 million, said it would work with international partners to provide content for its 5G platform and build a 5G ecosystem.
With the launch of 5G, Asia Pacific Telecom would focus on smart manufacturing, smart energy, smart transportation, smart retail and smart medical care.
Far EasTone (FET) initially launched its commercial 5G network in some metropolitan areas across Taiwan. Ericsson was the sole provider of the radio access network (RAN) and 5G core technology for this launch.
FET said it aims to deploy a total of 4,000 5G base stations across Taiwan by the end of the year to provide coverage to nearly half of the population.
Taipei Times reported that the operator plans to invest up to NT$30 billion ($1 billion) in its 5G network deployment over the next three years, as it expects half of its mobile subscribers to migrate to 5G services by 2023. FET had previously secured 80 megahertz in the 3.5 GHz band and 400 megahertz in the 28 GHz band.
Meanwhile, Taiwan Mobile expects to deploy 4,000 5G base stations by the end of this year, according to previous reports. Taiwan Mobile partnered with Nokia to launch its 5G network.
Taiwan Mobile had acquired 60 megahertz of spectrum in the 3.5 GHz band and 200 megahertz of the 28 GHz frequency.
Rival operators Chunghwa Telecom launched commercial 5G services on July 1 using equipment from Ericsson. Ericsson has deployed Ericsson Radio System 5G non-standalone technology on the 3.5 GHz and 2.1 GHz bands for Chunghwa Telecom.
Chunghwa Telecom has been deploying 5G base stations in the municipalities of Taipei, New Taipei, Taoyuan, Taichung, Tainan and Kaohsiung.
The operator recently said it had more than 2,000 5G base stations in 22 cities by end-June. It aims to have full coverage in major cities and transportation lines using the 3.5GHz and 2.1GHz bands by end-2020, and nationwide coverage by end-2021 with more than 8,500 sites.
