It looks like Colombia’s 5G spectrum auction is still on course to take place on 20 December, as stated by the Ministry of Information Technologies and Communications (Ministerio de Tecnologias de la Informacion y las Comunicaciones, MinTIC) in June.
MinTIC has now closed the call for the upcoming 5G spectrum auction, which includes the 700MHz, 1900MHz, AWS extended, 2500MHz and 3500MHz bands.
Major operators, including Claro, Movistar, Tigo and Wom, all submitted their participation applications before yesterday’s 4pm deadline. They were joined by a newer player in the wireless market: Brazilian company Telecall.
According to TeleGeography's CommsUpdate, Telecall Colombia is an affiliate of Rio de Janeiro-based B2B operator Telexperts Telecomunicacoes (Telecall) which operates fibre-optic backbone networks in Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. It launched MVNO services in 2019 and then deployed an MVNA platform, which has supported the launches of more than 30 virtual operators.
In addition, Tigo and Movistar are participating as a temporary network sharing joint venture while continuing to operate as independent competitors in the market. Colombian business regulator the Superintendencia de Industria y Comercio (SIC) approved the partnership in October.
The auction participants will be formally confirmed on 4 December, although, according to news resource BNN, companies from other sectors such as digital entertainment and wholesale trade have also shown interest in an auction that the government hopes will earn between 1.5 and 2 trillion pesos (about US$380 million).
