4G Global Update - August 12, 2011

 

Spectrum Auction Funds Expansion in Columbia

TeleGeography

Colombia's Ministry of Communications and ICT has awarded 25 MHz spectrum in the 1900 MHz band. Tigo and Comcel each were awarded 5 MHz in band A, while Telefonica Moviles won 5 MHz in band D, and 10 MHz in band E. The allocation was part of a government strategy to increase the resources available to telcos, allowing them to improve services. The auction raised $79.8 million, which will be split 50/50 between the "Vive Digital" program and network expansion into rural areas. Vive Digital aims to increase the country's broadband subscribers to 8.8 million by 2014. More

 

Study: Asia/Pacific Will Be LTE World Leader by 2014

Light Reading

The Asia/Pacific region will have the most LTE subscribers in the world by the end of 2014, according to a recent report from Pyramid Research. The region has become a hotbed of LTE activity, driven by the swift rate of smartphone adoption, the surge in mobile data usage as well as the demand for bandwidth-hungry applications, according to the report, "Asia-Pacific to Be Global Leader in LTE by 2014." More

 

Report: AT&T Hires Bankers to Advise Asset Sales

The Wall Street Journal

AT&T has hired bankers to advise it on selling assets, in a significant step aimed at winning government approval for its planned $39 billion purchase of T-Mobile USA, according to people familiar with the matter. The U.S. telecommunications giant hired Bank of America Merrill Lynch to line up buyers of customers and wireless spectrum. The assets sales could be worth $8 billion or more, the people said, based on internal analyses of the customer markets that might have to be shed to gain regulatory approval. The deal could be green-lighted by the end of the first quarter of 2012. The bank hasn't launched a formal sale process yet, and isn't expected to do so until closer to the time when AT&T expects to receive regulatory approval for the purchase. More

 

P1 Reaches Agreement with States to Boost 4G Network Rollout in Malaysia

Packet One Networks

Packet One Networks has signed an agreement with eight state-backed companies under the umbrella of Persatuan Penyedia Infrastruktur Telekomunikasi to further boost its 4G service provision in the country. P1 currently covers 45 percent of the population and aims to hit 65 percent by 2012. In the past, P1 worked with individual States to secure telecommunication tower leases, but this agreement standardizes its commitment to working with all states to further boost its 4G network rollout. More

 

LTE Market is Forecast to Grow Rapidly to $68 billion in 2016

Display plus

The LTE market is a high-growth category in the mobile industry, with revenues expected to grow rapidly to $68 billion in 2016, according to Visiongain's research. To capitalize, infrastructure vendors are offering tailored managed services alongside their LTE product portfolio. The managed services market was around $55 billion in 2010, and it is poised to reach $86 billion by 2016. Operators across the globe are embracing managed services particularly in the EMEA region, Asia Pacific and the emerging markets of India and China. However, many U.S. carriers view networks as a source of competitive advantage and do not want to embark on managed services strategy. Visiongain believes that these carriers will continue to manage the networks in-house until 2013, with LTE deployment providing the necessary cost saving needed to increase the EBITDA levels. The study says a properly structured and executed managed service for LTE networks will deliver between 10 percent and 20 percent OpEx savings, which in certain cases can have a real effect of increasing EBITDA by 8 percent. More

 

S&P Cuts Telefónica's Rating

Light Reading

Telefónica, Huawei Technologies and Alcatel-Lucent take pole position in today's race through the EMEA telecom headlines. A couple of weeks after Telefónica revealed second-quarter profits had tumbled by 27 percent, credit rating agency Standard & Poor's has cut the Spanish giant's long-term rating to BBB+ from A-, Reuters reports. The economic turmoil in Spain has hit the carrier hard, a continued strong performance in Latin America notwithstanding. More