Mexico’s Federal Telecommunications Institute (Instituto Federal de Telecomunicaciones, IFT) has agreed to relax the coverage obligations of wholesale 4G provider Red Compartida. As per its original licence agreement, the company agreed to roll out infrastructure covering 92.2% of the population by January 2024, but fell behind schedule in 2021 and went on to file for bankruptcy protection later that year. The watchdog must now comply with the 92.2% milestone by 24 January 2028. Meanwhile, an interim target of 70% has been set for 30 November 2022.
According to TeleGeography’s GlobalComms Database, in November 2016 ALTAN Redes – a consortium including Axtel, Megacable and the International Finance Corporation (IFC) – was selected as the winner of a government tender to establish an open-access 700MHz wholesale network. Red Compartida went live in March 2018 and currently covers 69.58% of the population.
Red Compartida reached the five million subscriptions milestone in December 2021, up from just 200,000 at the end of 2019. Of the top-line figure, 3.839 million accounts were for mobile use, while the remaining 1.163 million users were signed up to fixed wireless plans. A total of 112 MVNOs utilised the network at end-2021.