The Government of Hong Kong aims to assign new spectrum in the 850/900 MHz, 2.3 GHz and 6/7 GHz bands
Hong Kong’s Office of the Communications Authority (OFCA) has recently published the information for the auctions of spectrum in the 850/900 MHz, 2.3 GHz and 6/7 GHz bands.
The government agency also issued a formal invitation for interested parties to submit applications.
“The Communications Authority (CA) and the Secretary for Commerce and Economic Development (SCED) issued joint statements in May last year and March this year, announcing the decisions to assign a total of 510 megahertz of spectrum in the aforementioned bands through auction within this year for the provision of public mobile services including 5G services. The assignment will further promote the development of 5G services in terms of network capacity, service speed and coverage,” a spokesperson for OFCA said.
The CA will conduct the auction of 110 megahertz of re-assigned spectrum in the 850/900 MHz and 2.3 GHz bands on November 11, followed by the auction of 400 megahertz of new airwaves in the 6/7 GHz band on November 25.
OFCA also noted that the spectrum will be assigned to the successful bidders under unified carrier licenses with a validity period of 15 years. Parties interested in participating in the auctions may submit their applications to OFCA on September 19-20.
The SCED has set the auction reserve prices of HKD4 million ($512,000) per megahertz for the 850/900 MHz and the 2.3 GHz bands, and HKD2 million per megahertz for the 6/7 GHz band. The actual amount of spectrum utilization fees payable will be determined through the respective auctions, OFCA added.
“To prevent over-concentration of spectrum holdings by a single spectrum assignee, the CA has set caps on the amount of spectrum that can be acquired by each assignee in the respective bands, which are 10 megahertz for the 850/900 MHz band, 50 megahertz for the 2.3 GHz band and 140 megahertz for the 6/7 GHz band,” the spokesperson added.
Last month, OFCA announced the results of the second round assignment of the frequencies in the 26 GHz and 28 GHz bands.
The regulator also noted that a total of 1,200 megahertz of the spectrum will be assigned in the third quarter of this year to Mobile Hong Kong (CMHK), Hong Kong Telecommunications (HKT), Hutchison Telephone Company (HTCL) and SmarTone.
Having reviewed the applications submitted by the four telcos, the CA decided to assign 600 megahertz of the spectrum to HTCL and an additional 200 megahertz of the spectrum to each of the three MNOs, namely, CMHK, HKT and SmarTone, on top of the 400 megahertz of the spectrum already assigned to each of them in 2019
China Mobile Hong Kong, Hutchinson and HKT had launched commercial 5G services in Hong Kong in April 2020, while SmarTone, announced the launch of commercial 5G services in the territory using Ericsson’s Dynamic Spectrum Technology (DSS) in May 2020.
Local operators had acquired 200 megahertz of 3.5 GHz spectrum in mid-October 2019. Those 5G licenses are valid for a 15-year period.
