With India planning to carry out the next spectrum auction in January-February 2024, analysts expect less intense bidding than the previous auction held in July 2022.
According to market sources, India's Department of Telecommunications (DoT) will put on the block all the unsold spectrum bands from the last auction.
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has declined to provide base bidding prices for any new frequency bands or fresh reserve prices for any of the spectrum bands already in use by mobile service providers.
IDC's Asia Pacific senior market analyst for Telecom and IoT, Swathi Arunaa told iTnews Asia that the 2024 auction might not see "intense" bidding but some action may be witnessed if the spectrum is opened to technology firms, who in the earlier auction expressed interest in direct allotment to them for setting up private networks for captive use.
With Reliance's extended spending to buy spectrum in 700 MHz last year, Arunaa said the firm may now look to acquire airwave in other bands.
She added that Bharti Airtel will target to buy spectrum blocks in circles with its airwave holdings expiring next year.
Arunaa predicted Vodafone Idea may not spend much in the upcoming auction due to its financial setbacks in clearing dues and its delay in launching 5G commercially.
Joint Wireless Advisor Gulab Chand from DoT told the India Spectrum Management Conference that the government is trying to hold spectrum auctions by the end of the current fiscal or early next fiscal year.
The government, in 2022, had put a total of 72,097.85 MHz of spectrum for auction with a validity period of 20 years.
The frequencies included 600 megahertz (MHz), 700 MHz, 800 MHz, 900 MHz, 1800 MHz, 2100 MHz, 2300 MHz, 3300 MHz and 26 gigahertz (GHz) bands.
India received total bids worth around US$19 billion (S$26 billion) in the auction, after a final tally was done, with Reliance Jio spending US$11.13 billion followed by US$5.44 billion from Bharti Airtel and US$2.37 billion by Vodafone.
The government now has some unsold spectrum worth less than US$32 billion from last year’s sale, including the 600MHz and 2300MHz bands and new spectrum at frequencies ranging from 37-37.5 GHz, 37.5-40 GHz and 42.5-43.5 GHz.
Chand said much of the spectrum allocated in the lower bands is due to expire this fiscal year with telecom operators would like to acquire the bands again.
He added the lower frequency bands would be similarly priced as in the previous auction.
At the same time, Chand added that it would take some time to decide on pricing and other modalities for new frequency bands.
According to a report in June, DoT announced that it is keen to offer the 3.7GHz-4.2GHz band, the L-band (1427MHz-1518MHz), the 470MHz-582MHz band and 37GHz millimetre wave (mmWave) frequencies for 5G mobile telephony. The 37GHz band would be a new spectrum, once it is on offer.
