After being postponed since the end of 2011 and rescheduled three times, Indonesia’s Ministry of Communication and Information Technology finally announced that the channel 11 and 12 3G frequency tender will be held later in September 2012. But the government department still hasn’t set the date.
This tender will be a major deal for all mobile carriers and the public. The capacity of two 3G channels for carriers was already overloaded, sometimes disrupting data services, or even voice calls and SMS. So the importance of this third channel cannot be overstated for the nation’s mobile users and industry.
Kompas cites the founder of the IndoLTE Forum, Heru Sutadi, as predicting that by November 2012, data traffic will have increased around 90 percent. He worries that Indonesian consumers will not be able to enjoy mobile services smoothly next year without the new 3G channel. According to Heru, the number of 3G broadband users in Indonesia has reached 107.35 million up to the first quarter of 2012 (as quoted by Investor Daily).
Mobile operator Telkomsel, as the biggest operator, has approximately 40 million data subscribers, Indosat 31.2 million, XL Axiata 27.9 million, 4.25 million from Axis Telekom Indonesia, and Hutchison CP Telecom/HCPT has 4 million.
Head of PR at the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, Gatot S. Dewa Broto, said in the interview that the third 3G channel tender fee will be IDR 200 billion (over US$20 million). This new price shows the escalation from the previous tender of IDR 160 to 175 billion. That price excluded the carriers’ up-front fees and annual fee.
According to Detik, a selection of additional blocks of 3G plans will be announced on September 17, and the retrieval of documents selection on September 19 to 24, 2012. ‘Telkomsel, XL Axiata, Axis Telecom Indonesia, and Hutchison CP Telecom all hope to acquire the last two blocks of the 12-block 3G channel.
Gatot said that the Ministry will provide the same frequency for this new channel as the previous one. Now block 11 and 12 are ready to be released. He stated that mobile subscribers will enjoy better quality connections as a result.
The bandwidth is getting wider, and this will improve things significantly. This frequency channel will be established side-by-side to fulfill public expectancy.
From a consumer point of view, this will certainly be welcome news if it means that 3G services indeed experience this kind of noticeable upgrade.
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