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Nigeria to Rake in N35 Billion From 2.6 GHZ Spectrum Auction(AllAfrica Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has released the guidelines for the auction of spectrum slots in the 2.6 gigahertz frequency band. The regulatory body is expected to rake in a minimum of $224 million (about N35.8 billion) into government coffers. This is in addition to over N300 billion it had generated from spectrum licensing in the last 13 years of deregulation in the telecoms sector. The Commission said the auction billed for the first week of December, 2014 in Abuja will adopt the application of Ascending Clock Auction (ACA) system. This auction is coming at a time when broadband development has been declared by the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) as a necessary tool for all nations to remain competitive in the 21st century. The drive for broadband penetration across the nooks and crannies of Nigeria is upbeat with the recent publication of the Information Memorandum (IM) on the proposed licensing of the 2.6 gigahertz spectrum. The IM defines the process that the Commission will adopt for the licensing of 2 X 70 MHz paired spectrum available in the 2.6 gigahertz band. It also provides information on the Nigerian telecommunications market, details of the spectrum to be made available, the pre-qualification process, the auction process and indicative timetable. According to the regulator, the process for licensing the new spectrum is predicated on demands by operators for additional spectrum to avail them the opportunity of providing advanced wireless broadband services for the country. Copyright Daily Independent. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). |