INA Academy has successfully completed the training workshop on “Mobile Broadband: a pillar for the Future Information Society”. The workshop was addressed to Policy Makers, Regulators, Corporate Executives and Managers dealing with regulatory and business issues related to mobile broadband. The workshop was held at the Journalists' House in Nicosia, Cyprus over the period 31 May-2 June 2010 and was kindly hosted by Cyta.

The participation in the workshop has been very high with attendants coming from W. Europe, S.E. Europe and Balkans. The total number of attendants exceeded 25, the majority of whom coming from NRAs, ICT institutions and organizations, as well telecom operators and vendors. It is believed that the whole spectrum of the ICT industry has actively participated in the workshop, meeting and/or exceeding initial expectations.

Throughout the three days of the workshop several interesting presentations and discussions took place. All participants, as indicated above, engaged into very insightful and thought-provoking debates that assisted into developing some overall directions on the subjects examined. As it is well understood, it is rather hard to reach tangible and specific conclusions in the underlying areas that have been thoroughly addressed, since any conclusions are greatly dependent on market and country’s respective characteristics and aspirations. However some overall directions/recommendations have been concluded. These are summarized below :

• Mobile broadband can facilitate the implementation of the European vision of providing universal broadband: For example, operators deploying new mobile technologies such as LTE can easily achieve the same coverage as GSM networks using their existing base station sites and provide improved penetration and bandwidth availability to underserviced and rural areas. For example, the 800 MHz frequency band is particularly attractive for deployment in rural areas due to its greater reach, enabling operators to meet their mobile broadband access targets cost efficiently. Positive effects on Member State economies are possible through greater growth, innovation and competition, and from strengthening EU markets for equipment and services.

• Mobile Broadband - Helping bridge the digital divide: mobile broadband services can generate significant social benefits, helping to boost local economies, delivering social services like m-healthcare, e-education, improving democracy through e-governance and generally raising the standards of living. Mobile broadband services can also be used for improved public safety services, when existing pan-European public safety networks (TETRA and Tetrapol) can currently only provide narrowband services.

• Increased spectrum needed to deliver efficient broadband services: Economic, demand, and technical factors are driving operators to seek substantially more spectrum to improve their efficiencies and deploy better and new broadband services to customers. Emerging demands for mobile broadband services are most efficiently provided by new broadband wireless technologies using wider channel bandwidths than systems deployed earlier to handle voice-dominated traffic streams. Anticipated spectrum requirements that are several times larger than the total amount of spectrum currently allocated to commercial mobile communications in some countries.

• The opening of new frequency bands will enable mobile broadband: A huge opportunity for the mobile telecoms industry is provided by the opening of the 2.6 GHz band, the freed-up UHF frequencies (the “digital dividend” spectrum (470-862 MHz) to be made available after the switchover from analogue to digital TV broadcasting), as well as by anticipated and planned auctions or other forms of spectrum attributions in bands that vary by country or region.

• Pan European and even International coordination is needed to define frequency bands and spectrum for mobile broadband. There are huge potential economic benefits in ensuring that the same equipment can operate in the same frequencies across the EU. This will create significant economies of scale for equipment manufacturers and drive down the price, which will in turn stimulate further consumer demand and make these services more accessible, especially in the current economic climate. In the converging telecoms environment both fixed and mobile services will be offered using the same technology, therefore differentiating the spectrum between these services may not be necessary.

• Why, despite all its inherent benefits, has mobile broadband not taken off? Policy makers and Regulators in countries all over Europe are exploring the ways to make the most of this spectrum re-allocation opportunity looking after the consumer’s benefit from innovative services and preserving fairness and technology neutrality between market players. There is now an urgent need for policy instruments for support. Regulators and Governments need to play their part. For example, access to appropriate spectrum clearly affects the business model positively; clear regulatory frameworks reduce investor anxiety.

View the Workshop Agenda here.

View the Workshop Presentations:
• Day 1
• Day 2
• Day 3