Three companies — Sejong Telecom Inc., Stage X Co. and My Mobile Consortium — will participate in the auction for the frequency band. (Image courtesy of Yonhap)
SEOUL, Jan. 25 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s Ministry of Science and ICT will kick off the bidding process for the 28 gigahertz spectrum Thursday, aimed at establishing the country’s fourth official mobile carrier.
Three companies — Sejong Telecom Inc., Stage X Co. and My Mobile Consortium — will participate in the auction for the frequency band that will last for up to 50 rounds, according to the ministry.
The rounds will continue until only one company remains, and in the case of multiple candidates at the end of all 50 rounds, the spectrum will be awarded to the operator with the highest bid.
The auction will start at 74.2 billion won (US$55.7 million), but it is widely expected that the final bid will be in the 100 billion-won range.
In the previous auction in 2018, the country’s three major mobile carriers — SK Telecom Co., KT Corp. and LG Uplus Corp. — won the same spectrum in the low 200 billion-won range.
However, these three operators lost the license for the new 28 GHz spectrum last year due to insufficient investment.
As a response, the South Korean government has taken steps to introduce a new operator to foster competition in an industry traditionally dominated by the three major carriers.
If one of the three bidders secures the frequency band, it will be required to build 6,000 base stations nationwide within the first three years and implement measures to address frequency congestion and interference.
(Yonhap)
