Govt forsakes financial gain to facilitate faster 5G

Thu, 25 Jun 2020

The allocation of early access rights in the 3.5 gigahertz band for 5G services will be cheaper for telcos than it would have been pre-covid, but the government is willing to take the revenue hit if it means rolling out the service. The government had planned to auction off spectrum for the early-access stage of 5G, but canned the idea when the covid-19 pandemic hit, instead allocating blocks to Dense Air, Spark New Zealand and Two Degrees Mobile. Vodafone NZ had enough spectrum to press ahead with its own plans. A second auction is stil...

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