- India's mobile spectrum auction saw never-seen-before huge investments in airwaves as bidding closed on Tuesday, with around 86% of the available spectrum sold. The bidding which opened on March 4 witnessed the government raising a record of 1.08 trillion rupees ($17.07 billion) in just 13 days, exceeding the INR1.06 billion ($17 billion) generated by the auction in 2010, which lasted 34 days.
"The bidding is taking place in all bands. Brisk bidding was seen on 9th day of bidding, with activity requirement set at 100 percent. There is robust bidding going on in all bands, that is, 2100 MHz, 1800 MHz, 900 MHz and 800 MHz bands," said India's Department of Telecom (DoT). "At the end of 49th round, over 86%of the spectrum has been provisionally allocated to bidders at a value of approximately Rs.1,02,000 crores [Rs 1.02tn]. Majority of service areas are going at a premium over reserve price. The competitive bidding is expected to continue."
According to news source, there was an intensive fight during the auction between all major players in the Indian telco market - Bharti Airtel, Vodafone, Idea Cellular and Reliance Communications, and new entrant Reliance Jio - in particular for the contiguous blocks of either 5 MHz or 3.75 MHz in the 800 MHz spectrum, which are used for the deployment of LTE.
