South Africa spectrum auction tops expectations
March 14, 2022
By Chris Forrester
South Africa’s ongoing cellular spectrum auction has already raised more cash than was expected. The session on March 11th ended with bids of more than 8 billion Rand (about €484m).
“ICASA is pleased to announce that the auction is proceeding very well and can confirm that we have gradually passed estimated R8-billion in proceeds. The auction will proceed on Monday, 14 March, at 9am,” the regulator said in a statement.
Telkom and Rain secured access to spectrum during an opt-in early round of the auction last Tuesday that netted R2.65 billion for the national treasury. Rain agreed to pay R1.15-billion for access to two chunks of 10MHz of spectrum in the 700MHz band and for 10MHz of the 2.6GHz band, while Telkom agreed to pay R1.5-billion for two slices of 10MHz in the 800MHz band.
Other companies that are participating in the auction are Cell C, Rain, Telkom, and Liquid Intelligence.
Chairperson of ICASA, Keabetswe Modimoeng, said: “This process provides a critical stimulus for economic recovery and has the potential to stimulate employment by leveraging on ICT networks and digital platforms to deliver economic value for the SA society.”
However, there’s still the matter of legal activity with a High Court hearing to examine an action started by analogue broadcasting from the popular e.tv channel.