CDMAs may relocate to new frequency spectrum band

Ben Uzor Jr

There are strong indications that Private Telephony Operators (PTO) otherwise known as CDMA operators in Nigeria’s highly competitive telecommunications market may soon be relocated to a new frequency spectrum band. Eugene Juwah, executive vice chairman of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) gave the hint on Tuesday at the 4th West Africa Information and Communications Technology (WAFICT) Congress held in Lagos. This said this move would assist in freeing up already scare resources for more telecoms operators without requisite spectrum allocation to deploy innovative and reasonably priced broadband services to the generality of the Nigerian population.

These, indeed, are not the best of times for CDMAs - as some of them are finding it extremely difficult to survive the stiff competition in the nation’s telecoms industry. Analysts who spoke with Business Day yesterday, said subscriber preference for GSM technology, as well as corporate governance issues, low capitalisation and poor promotion of CDMA technology, have seen the fortunes of these CDMA operators decline over the years. “It is a well know fact the spectrum band between 790 – 862 MHz is been occupied mostly by the CDMA players. Normally, the CDMA frequencies are not efficiently planned as is the case with Long Term Evolution (LTE) frequencies.

“We have asked CDMA players who have tiny frequencies (5 up, 5 down) which cannot do much on LTE to upgrade. We have said if they are prepared to upgrade, the commission will re-farm these frequencies and give them a higher slot in terms of capacity to provide value services, but they must do LTE. A lot of them are already considering it. Very soon, CDMAs will have difficulty finding appropriate handsets because technology is changing. As they begin to realize this, CDMAs will begin to plan for LTE. Considering their poor performances, analysts told Business Day yesterday that CDMAs must consider migrating to LTE as this new wireless platform offers them capabilities to provide innovative services well beyond mundane voice and data.

According to Juwah, this migration will not require any form of licensing from the commission. The NCC helmsman also told the congress which attracted a broad spectrum of stakeholders ranging from policy makers, operators, academia to industry regulators that the commission was willing to provide necessary financial incentives to CDMA operators in order to facilitate this migration. A recent newspaper report disclosed that the commission had embargoed spectrum allocation until 2015. Giving further clarifications on the matter, Juwah said the only frequency spectrum available to the commission currently was in the 2.3GHz band, adding that spectrum will be auctioned this year.

 “If the NCC has more spectrums, we will give it out. But we must plan well in line with international standards. The only spectrum NCC has is in the 2.3GHz band and we are going to auction it this year. We have decided at the National Frequency Management Council (NFMC) that the 2.6GHz which is the spectrum telecoms need, we will plan with broadcasting industry, re-farm them and decide how to allocate them to telecoms providers. However, these frequencies will become free in 2015. Frequencies below the 790 MHz, NCC has fought for this band to be allocated to Africa. But the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) says they won’t be free until 2015. If you check frequencies in 2.1 GHz (3G), Nigeria has offered more frequencies than any other country in the world with little impact in terms of broadband penetration.”