The National Communications Commission (NCC) yesterday said that the government would release the 2,500MHz and 2,600MHz frequency bands for 4G telecom service use, adding that the auction of these two bands is scheduled to take place at the end of the third quarter this year.
NCC Chairperson Howard Shyr (石世豪) said that the commission would hold an information session next month, in which the commission’s officials would explain the rules of the auction and other relevant matters in detail, and hear thoughts and ideas from interested carriers.
As some of the frequency blocks are currently being used by WiMAX service operators, Shyr said that the WiMAX carriers could continue to use these frequencies if their licenses are renewed, allowing them to use the spectrum for another six years. The 4G operators acquiring frequencies in the spectrum currently used by WiMAX operators could gain access if the two parties negotiate a deal, he said.
Shyr said that First International Telecom and Far EasTone Telecommunications have both terminated WiMAX offerings and returned portions of the spectrum they used to the government, adding that Tatung Infocomm’s WiMAX license renewal had already been turned down by the NCC. The commission plans to review the license renewal applications from three other WiMAX operators this year — Global Mobile, VMAX and VeeTim.
Based on the commission’s preliminary plan, the two stated frequency bands have 190MHz in bandwidth that would be placed on auction. Within that spectrum, 50MHz would be reserved for use by time division-long term evolution (TD-LTE) technology, whereas the remaining 140MHz would be used for the development of TD-LTE or frequency division-long term evolution (FD-LTE) technology.
To avoid interference between these two technologies, telecoms acquiring TD-LTE bandwidth must give up 10MHz to be used as guard bands.
TD-LTE and FD-LTE are the two main technologies used to offer 4G services.
Asked whether the development of TD-LTE would generate national security concerns, as China has been pushing the use of such technology and is the main supplier of related equipment, Shyr said that the plan to release the frequency bands has been reviewed by the nation’s national security agencies, which have not changed their standards.
Shyr said, current 4G service providers can acquire these bandwidths to enlarge their capacity in a bid to meet dramatically increasing demand for data transmission.
He also said that the commission would set a lock-up period, which would require telecom carriers to fulfill their service commitments before they can be allowed to merge their operations.
In response to some telecom carriers’ claims that they do not need additional bandwidth to offer 4G services, Shyr said that the commission would this year begin testing the transmission speeds of 4G services offered by different carriers, and that the test results would be disclosed to the public periodically.
Carriers do not have to bid for additional bandwidth if they do not need them, he said.
Taiwan began to release frequency bands for 4G operation last year, in which three frequency bands — 700MHz, 900MHz and 1,800 MHz — were placed on public auction.
Six telecom carriers garnered a total bandwidth of 270 MHz within these three bands — Chunghwa Telecom, Taiwan Mobile, Far EasTone, Asia Pacific Telecom, Ambit Microsystems Corp and Taiwan Star. The merger of Asia Pacific and Ambit, which occurred soon after the auction, has yet to be approved by the NCC.
The government received NT$118.6 billion (US$3.8 billion) from the auction last year, three times higher than the floor price. This year, the government has set the income from the auction to be at least NT$25 billion.
Telecoms offering 4G service began LTE operations at the end of May last year, the administration said, adding that 4G service subscribers have grown to a total of 4.02 million as of last month.
A strong continental cold air mass and abundant moisture bringing snow to mountains 3,000m and higher over the past few days are a reminder that more than 60 years ago Taiwan had an outdoor ski resort that gradually disappeared in part due to climate change. On Oct. 24, 2021, the National Development Council posted a series of photographs on Facebook recounting the days when Taiwan had a ski resort on Hehuanshan (合歡山) in Nantou County. More than 60 years ago, when developing a branch of the Central Cross-Island Highway, the government discovered that Hehuanshan, with an elevation of more than 3,100m,
Taiwan’s population last year shrank further and births continued to decline to a yearly low, the Ministry of the Interior announced today. The ministry published the 2024 population demographics statistics, highlighting record lows in births and bringing attention to Taiwan’s aging population. The nation’s population last year stood at 23,400,220, a decrease of 20,222 individuals compared to 2023. Last year, there were 134,856 births, representing a crude birth rate of 5.76 per 1,000 people, a slight decline from 2023’s 135,571 births and 5.81 crude birth rate. This decrease of 715 births resulted in a new record low per the ministry’s data. Since 2016, which saw
SECURITY: To protect the nation’s Internet cables, the navy should use buoys marking waters within 50m of them as a restricted zone, a former navy squadron commander said A Chinese cargo ship repeatedly intruded into Taiwan’s contiguous and sovereign waters for three months before allegedly damaging an undersea Internet cable off Kaohsiung, a Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times) investigation revealed. Using publicly available information, the Liberty Times was able to reconstruct the Shunxing-39’s movements near Taiwan since Double Ten National Day last year. Taiwanese officials did not respond to the freighter’s intrusions until Friday last week, when the ship, registered in Cameroon and Tanzania, turned off its automatic identification system shortly before damage was inflicted to a key cable linking Taiwan to the rest of
China’s newest Type-076 amphibious assault ship has two strengths and weaknesses, wrote a Taiwanese defense expert, adding that further observations of its capabilities are warranted. Jiang Hsin-biao (江炘杓), an assistant researcher at the National Defense and Security Research, made the comments in a report recently published by the institute about the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) military and political development. China christened its new assault ship Sichuan in a ceremony on Dec. 27 last year at Shanghai’s Hudong Shipyard, China’s Xinhua news agency reported. “The vessel, described as the world’s largest amphibious assault ship by the [US think tank] Center for Strategic and International
RSS