India Plans to Auction 5G Airwaves by End-July to Spur Rollout

Customers try out a Samsung Electronics Co. Galaxy Z Fold2 5G smartphone at the company's D'light flagship store in Seoul, South Korea, on Tuesday, Oct. 6, 2020. Samsung were among a list of global firms that were cleared by India’s Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology that won approval to manufacture products in India under a plan aimed at attracting investment of more than 10.5 trillion rupees ($143 billion) for mobile-phone production over the next five years. Photographer: SeongJoon Cho/Bloomberg , Bloomberg

Kripa Jayaram, Bloomberg News

Jun 15, 2022

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(Bloomberg) -- India will auction 5G airwaves by the end of July when three operators -- Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd., Bharti Airtel Ltd. and Vodafone Idea Ltd. -- are expected to compete fiercely as they gear up to roll out ultra-speedy networks.

The federal government plans to sell 72 gigahertz of telecom spectrum for a 20-year tenure, according to a statement from the Ministry of Communications. The auction will be held for airwaves in various frequency bands ranging from 600 megahertz to 26 gigahertz.

“It is expected that the mid and high band spectrum will be utilized by telecom service providers to roll-out of 5G technology-based services,” the ministry said in the statement.

The 5G airwaves auction will help the Narendra Modi-led government boost the exchequer at a time when it will be footing a $26 billion inflation-fighting fiscal package that includes lower fuel taxes and import levies. The spectrum sale will also be the next battlefield for billionaires Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Jio, Sunil Mittal-helmed Bharti and Vodafone Group Plc’s India unit which are planning to launch 5G networks and sign up high-end subscribers.

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