Korean cdma2000 consortium wants lower license fees

date: 15th February 2001, source by: telecomasia.net

A consortium of companies looking to get a cdma2000 operator’s license wants the government to lower its 3G license fees, effectively confirming the inferior business case for a 3G network using the American-developed technology platform.

While the government’s licensing criteria currently calls for a fee of 1.1 trillion won ($880 million) for each 3G license, the cdma2000 Grand Consortium, which includes major Korean companies like Samsung and overseas firm, Qualcomm, wants the government to lower the fees to 220 billion won ($176 million), a discount of some 75% over two licenses awarded last December.

The government awarded two 3G licenses using the European and Japanese-developed W-CDMA to incumbent mobile operators, SK Telecom and Korea Telecom. A third 3G license, using Qualcomm’s cdma2000 technology, is scheduled to be awarded by the end of February.

LG Telecom, the third of the incumbent mobile operators in Korea, has repeatedly said it saw no business case for building a new 3G network using the cdma2000 platform. LG Telecom as well as rival second-generation mobile operators, SK Telecom and Korea Telecom, all operate CDMA networks that already support an upgrade to cdma2000.

Since its failure to gain a 3G license using W-CDMA in October, LG Telecom has reportedly asked the government to help in selling its mobile operations.

Fixed line carrier, Hanaro Telecom is expected to lead the new cdma2000 Grand consortium for the third license.

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