CAT seeks two-year use of 1,800MHz spectrum

CAT Telecom will ask the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission's legal subcommittee whether CAT can continue using the 1,800-megahertz spectrum for a short period after the expiry of its Digital Phone Co (DPC) and TrueMove concessions this September.

CAT wants to use the spectrum to serve TrueMove's and DPC's combined 17 million subscribers during a two-year transition period after their concessions end.

CAT chief executive officer Kittisak Sriprasert said yesterday that his agency knew it had to return the spectrum for NBTC reallocation but it still wanted the commission to consider granting its use during the transition period.

The CAT board will also consider on February 27 how to deal with this issue if it cannot keep the bandwidth on the 1,800MHz spectrum it granted to TrueMove and DPC to provide cellular |service.

The board will also discuss the possibility to utilising 25MHz bandwidth of the spectrum, currently unused, of its other concessionaire Total Access Communication (DTAC) to serve DPC and TrueMove subscribers. DTAC holds 50MHz of the 1,800MHz spectrum, of which it currently uses half. DTAC's concession does not expire until 2018.

The NBTC will reclaim bandwidth on the 1,800MHz spectrum from DPC and TrueMove for auction.

It has tentatively set the third quarter of next year as the period in which it will call bids for the spectrum.

An NBTC subcommittee has proposed that the watchdog |auction 20MHz of the spectrum, and that each participant be allowed to bid for a maximum of 10MHz to ensure meaningful competition. It also recommended that the auction make available four slots of 5MHz bandwidth each.