Hopes of sharing out the broadband spectrum abandoned by ministers

To fulfil the ambition of broadband for all by Lord Carter the government is thinking about capping the amount of radio spectrum that Britain’s mobile phone companies own as it attempts to make a deal.

O2 and Vodafone could be allowed to keep the part of the airwaves that they was given back in the 1980’s and their rival had hoped they would be made to share, in a plan that was put together by Kip Meek, the communications minister’s lieutenant.

Although, unless they sell some of their other holdings the plan would prohibit them from obtaining some of the freed up spectrum that will become available in 2012 when the analogue TV signal is turned off.

In order to meet the vision of the government to get 2Mbps broadband speeds to around 1.5 million homes that at the moment cannot be reached the deal will be an essential stop gap.

With a deadline of 30th April set by Carter it was concluded by Meek that it would not be possible to talk the two operators into sharing their spectrum, which was considered to be ideal for broadband in rural areas. Once the analogue TV signal is turned off the new spectrum will be useable by the whole industry for rural broadband, although it will be 2012 before this new spectrum becomes available.

The obligation for the UK’s five networks to expand their 3G networks to cover more than 90 percent of the population of the UK would be included in the deal. The government has agreed to extend the licences that were purchased in 2000 at a price of £22.5 billion indefinitely in return for this.

Due to the expense of upgrading the fixed line network Lord Carter believes that bringing high-speed internet access to rural areas will see mobile broadband playing a very important role with satellite broadband filling in the coverage gaps in the more remote areas.

The forcing of O2 and Vodafone to give up some of their 900MHz holding is something that both Orange and T-Mobile are hoping for, which could possibly mean that the deal will still fail. It has been made clear by Lord Carter that a deal will be imposed by Ofcom if the industry cannot reach one. The removal of enough spectrum from Vodafone and O2 for a single extra operator has been proposed by the regulator.