Refarming 900/1800 MHz

Throughout Europe, the frequencies in the 880-915/925-960 MHz and 1710-1785/1805-1880 MHz bands were assigned solely for the deployment of GSM technology. This harmonised restriction to a single standard enabled GSM to make its breakthrough and made mobile communications one of Europe's greatest technological achievements in the last century. Nearly 20 years later, however, newer and more efficient technologies have emerged, especially for data transmission: UMTS has already proven itself, and the next generation of mobile communications technology is LTE, which is said to enable data transmission rates of more than 100 Mbit/s.

In recent years, mobile data services have seen rapid growth in Austria. The number of data bits transmitted now exceeds the number of voice bits transmitted. This development calls for an economic reassessment of how the relevant frequencies are utilised. The regulatory authority has no doubt that the GSM frequencies can be used more efficiently with new technologies in the medium to long term. This is the case because newer technologies are generally more efficient (in terms of spectrum use) and because the 900 MHz frequencies could be used to improve mobile broadband coverage in rural areas. It therefore makes economic sense to open up the GSM bands for the deployment of other technologies (i.e., to "refarm" those frequencies).

 This will require legal adaptations at multiple levels. On June 15, 2009, the European Commission issued a mandate to CEPT to examine the technical conditions under which LTE could be deployed in the 900 and 1800 MHz bands, and whether any other relevant technologies are available for those frequency bands. This mandate resulted in three CEPT reports (Report 40, Report 41 and Report 42) which were approved by the ECC on November 12, 2010. On April 18 2011, the European Commission has published an amendment of the commission decision 2009/766/EC as 2011/251/EU in the OJ. The amendment stipulates that LTE and WiMAX can be operated in the 900 and 1800 MHz frequency bands (in addition to UMTS). The amendment calls for national implementation by December 31, 2011.

The next step is the implementation of these changes in the Austrian Frequency Utilisation Plan; only then can the Telekom-Control-Kommission (TKK) amend the use of frequencies (upon request) in the course of a procedure pursuant to Art. 57 of the Austrian Telecommunications Act (TKG) 2003. However, such changes give rise to a number of problems. One is the incompatibility of current assignments (which are based on 200 kHz channel spacing for GSM) with the requirements of new technologies (5 MHz blocks). Another problem is that of potential distortions of competition. Two of Austria's four mobile network operators do not have sufficient spectrum in the 900 MHz band to use those frequencies for 3G or 4G services. In such cases, both the Telecommunications Act and European legislation would require the regulatory authority to prohibit refarming or to impose requirements on operators. One conceivable remedy for the distortion of competition would be a redistribution of spectrum. Other obstacles include the additional frequency requirements which might arise during the transition phase due to the existing stock of GSM terminal devices and the wide UMTS and LTE channels, as well as the low investment incentives due to the relatively short remaining licence periods for GSM frequencies.

In March 2011 a public consultation (comments, results and further steps) was carried out with regard to this topic.

 Last update: September 19, 2011

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