By Juan Pedro Tomás
The president of Brazil’s National Telecommunications Agency (Anatel), Leonardo Euler, said that the publication of the 5G auction notice would probably occur in July or August, Brazilian IT site Teletime reported.
The 5G auction’s business plan was finished by Anatel on March 19, and now the regulator expects the country’s Federal Audit Court (TCU) to analyze it. “TCU has 90 days to pronounce on this, but there is a sense of urgency of the Court in relation to the importance of the matter,” Euler reportedly said.
After this analysis by the TCU, and in case there is no need for major adjustments, Anatel would still have another 30 days to publish the notice. “It is feasible that it will be in June, but I believe it will be more likely at the end of July or August,” the official said.
Earlier this year, the regulator had confirmed that Brazilian mobile operators must not rely on dynamic spectrum sharing (DSS) technology, which allows 4G and 5G networks to operate using the same spectrum band, for the provision of 5G services in Brazil.
Brazilian carriers will be forced to deploy 5G standalone networks by 2022, Anatel said. The rules also obliges operators to cover the vast northern Amazon region with broadband connectivity, chiefly using optic fiber cables laid in rivers, and build a separate secure network for the federal government.
Anatel opted not to implement any restrictions on the use of Huawei’s 5G network equipment, meaning that the Chinese company is likely to take part in the commercial deployment of 5G technology across Brazil.
Last year, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro was under pressure by the Trump administration to ban Huawei, but local telcos said that excluding the vendor would cost billions of dollars to replace the equipment of the Chinese vendor that supplies nearly 50 per cent of the current 3G and 4G networks in the country.
Brazil’s Ministry of Science, Technology, Innovations and Communications had approved Brazil’s 5G auction process in February 2020, with airwaves in the 700 MHz, 2.3 GHz and 3.5 GHz bands set for sale alongside 26 GHz mmWave spectrum.
The future deployment of 5G technology in Brazil could have a US$1.216 trillion economic impact and an increase in productivity of US$3.08 trillion, according to a previous study by Nokia and Omdia.
