Colombia will receive a 4G network after the government unveils an auction list to be fought over by the countries mobile service providers on Friday.
The auction is based around selling off available frequencies that provide 4G service, meaning faster internet and even the option for 3D television, among other things and will take place in January 2013 after final specifications will be made in November and December of 2012.
Colombia’s biggest service provider, Claro, will be looking to pick up most of the potential with over 29 million subscribers (two thirds of the countries population) with Movistar in second place with just over 12 million subscribers making the market a little bit too much of a monopoly.
With this in mind the government is looking to help the providers in a reform that will allow them to provide better and cheaper service, for example with the hope of reducing calls between networks from 5 cents to around 2.5 cents a minute from other providers.
The major providers will also be looking to reduce the number of failed calls from 6% this year to 4% in 2013 and eventually reaching 3% in 2014.
The government hope the move to bring 4G to Colombia will entice much smaller companies to evolve and grow to be competition for the bigger names, making the market much wider and fairer, however, they acknowledged that steps will have to be made to make the distribution of the 4G network relatively even.
However the service will be initially auctioned on a 2500 MHz bandwidth something that major provider Claro has worries about, officially stating that the ”inclusion to participate in the auction only in the 2500 MHz band to deploy 4G networks does not allow the company to compete on equal terms and therefore will counter to investment, legal certainty and delay the deployment of mobile broadband in the country.”
