Norway’s National Communications Authority (Nasjonal kommunikasjonsmyndighet, Nkom) has confirmed that a multi-band spectrum auction, in which it is offering a total of 4,379MHz, kicked off on 6 May. With the regulator claiming that the frequencies on offer will ‘contribute to further development of 5G and make … mobile networks more robust’, the available spectrum has been split into a total of 65 blocks across several bands – low, 10GHz and high, 10GHz, 13GHz, 18GHz, 23GHz, 28GHz, 32GHz and 38GHz – with pre-block reserve prices ranging from NOK14,000 (USD1,361) to NOK197,000. Meanwhile, there are two spectrum caps that will apply, with the first setting a 370MHz limit on the amount of spectrum that each operator may hold across the low 10GHz, high 10GHz and 13GHz bands. A second cap means each operator may hold no more than 2,545MHz across all eight of the bands in which frequencies are being made available.
As previously reported by CommsUpdate, in March 2020 the regulator publicly identified the six companies that had qualified to bid, namely: Ceragon Networks, Funn, GlobalConnect, Ice Communication Norge, Telenor Norge and Telia Norge. According to the Nkom, it has continuously assessed whether to proceed with the auction, given the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, but decided to do so in part after considering input from the companies that had registered to take part.
Source: https://www.commsupdate.com/articles/2020/05/06/nkom-confirms-start-of-multi-band-spectrum-auction/