A source from the Ministry of Information and Communications said that on May 15, May 5 and June 25, 5, the Ministry of Information and Communications held an auction of the 2MHz band, including 6 blocks of bands A2023 (2300-3 MHz), A1 (2300-2330 MHz), A2 (2330-2360 MHz). However, by the end of the deadline for submitting the application for registration to participate in the auction of each block A3, A2360, A2390, no enterprise submitted the application and paid a deposit to register for the auction. Therefore, the auctions of frequency use rights for the A1, A2, A3 band blocks are unsuccessful.
Previously, on February 24, 2, the Ministry of Information and Communications issued and publicly announced the plan to organize an auction of the right to use frequency for the 2023MHz band. There have been 2300 telecommunications enterprises submitted applications, namely VNPT, Viettel, MobiFone and Vietnamobile and were granted a certificate of eligibility to participate in the auction by the Ministry of Information and Communications. According to the provisions of Decree 4/88/ND-CP, only enterprises certified by the Ministry of Information and Communications to be eligible to participate in the auction can submit their dossiers to participate in the auction round.
Previously, the licensing of frequencies was approved by state agencies for businesses, followed by the form of auditions to get frequencies. Roughly speaking, the band is licensed for free for businesses. Every year, carriers only have to pay the band fee according to the regulations of the Ministry of Finance. Even the management agency at that time discussed a lot about having to collect telecommunications franchise fees with carriers.
However, the game is different now, when the Law on Radio Frequency takes effect and operators who want good frequency bands to provide services to customers will have to participate in a transparent and public auction.
According to the Radio Frequency Department's announcement, the starting price for auction of 2300-2400 MHz frequency for 3 band blocks is 17.394 billion VND. Specifically, the A1 (2300 – 2330 Mhz), A2 (2330 – 2360 Mhz) and A3 (2360 – 2390 Mhz) band blocks all have a starting price of VND 5.798 billion and a shelf life of 15 years.
With a starting price of VND 5.798 billion and a usage period of 15 years, each carrier will theoretically pay a frequency fee of at least VND 386 billion/year. This is not a small number for all mobile networks. In addition, to be able to provide services, carriers will have to invest in infrastructure and build new business models for 5G. This also represents a huge investment for carriers.
Analysts say that to build a nationwide mobile network, investors also have to spend several billion dollars in initial investment. However, in the context that traditional telecommunications services such as voice and SMS are declining, revenue from 5G is being divided in the future, it is necessary to spend a large amount of money to invest.
According to statistics from the Ministry of Information and Communications, Vietnam has 126 million mobile subscribers and the market is starting to reach saturation. Another statistic shows that each year, network operators are fighting for about 800.000 new subscribers to enter the market.
If in the previous 3G recruitment exam, the carriers brought a lively atmosphere to prepare the application documents, then with the auction of 4G and 5G frequencies this time, the atmosphere was quite quiet. The current conditions, it is imperative that network operators will have to calculate carefully when spending money on auctions and business efficiency problems. In addition to the above reasons, the transition from license-free to paid is also not an easy transition for carriers.
