By Kim Tong-hyung
Staff Reporter
SK Telecom is the biggest fish in the mobile telephony pond, but bitter rivals complain that the company's dominance has more to do with its exclusive use of a ``quality spectrum'' rather than successful business strategies.
Now the government is moving to end SK Telecom's monopoly, allowing KTF, LG Telecom and a possible fourth wireless operator to access low-frequency bands from 2011, although it bears further watching whether the new licenses will be enough to change the equation.
The Korea Communications Commission (KCC), the country's broadcasting and telecommunications regulator, said it will redistribute 40 megahertz (MHz) of bandwidth between the 800 MHz and 900 MHz frequencies to the smaller carriers to use for third-generation (3G) or other advanced wireless services.
The licenses will be handed out next year, the KCC said, with the carriers enabled to use the spectrums in July 2011, bringing an end to SK Telecom's monopoly of the 800MHz frequency band, which dates back to 1984.
The government will retake 20mhz from SK Telecom, which currently uses two blocks combining 50MHz with 800MHz frequency bandwidth. The company's current 800MHz frequency license expires in June 2011.
The other half of the available bandwidth comes from the 900 MHz frequency band, which is currently used for FM radio and public operations.
The spectrum up for grabs enables better voice quality and coverage than the 1.8 gigahertz (GHz) frequency bandwidths used by KTF and LG Telecom.
The lower frequencies have superior coverage and stronger wave diffraction, allowing signals to travel better through interfering objects such as hills and buildings, and the smaller carriers were required to invest more in base stations and repeaters to compete with SK Telecom.
The government hasn't decided how to redistribute the spectrums, although an auction a likely solution despite resistance from KTF and LG Telecom.
``We believe that the KCC's plans to redistribute the low-frequency bands may improve efficiency in the use of radio frequencies and improve the environment for fair competition,'' a KTF spokesman said.
The inevitable has become a reality for SK Telecom, but the top mobile carrier will look for compensation by acquiring more bandwidth within the 2.1 GHz frequency currently used for third-generation (3G) services.
With more mobile-phone users switching to data-enabled handsets, both SK Telecom and KTF are in need of more 3G bandwidth, and since LG Telecom returned its 2.1 GHz licenses after giving up on WCDMA, there is some room left to mingle.
KTF is planning to use its cut in the low-frequency band mainly to support its 3G network, and is pressing policymakers to hand out the licenses as quickly as possible to build the new network.
LG Telecom, the smallest of the three carriers, is planning to use the newly acquired bandwidth for fourth-generation (4G) services. In a news conference earlier this month, LG Telecom chief executive Jung Il-jae said the company plans to start commercial 4G services in 2013 after completing a nationwide network.
Although it's too early too tell how 4G would look, it's roughly thought as advanced wireless technology that provides data download speeds that are three to six times faster than the 14.4 megabytes per second (Mbps) to 3G services.
WiMAX, backed by companies such as Intel and Samsung Electronics, and Long Term Evolution (LTE), finding support among European vendors and wireless carriers, are the two competing technologies in the 4G standards race.
However, the smaller wireless carriers may find competition from cable system operators, who are looking for growth beyond the saturated pay-T.V. market and moving into mobile telecommunications.
An official from the Korea Cable Television Association (KCTA) said interest among cable operators to access the low-frequency band is high.
``Reallocating the spectrums to existing carriers wouldn't mean much, and it would be better to give new carriers the advantage in picking bandwidth to promote competition in the industry and lower consumer rates,'' said Seong Ki-hyeon, the KCTA's secretary general.
[출처 : 코리아타임스]
