3G / 4G Auction in Pakistan Rescheduled

While accepting various demands of telecom companies, the Government of Pakistan has announced that auction for 3G / 4G spectrum will be held on 23rd April 2014. This was announced after a Spectrum Auction Advisory committee meeting that was held today under the lead of Mr. Ishaq Dar, the Minister for Finance. Earlier, as per initial draft IM, the auction was planned to be held on April 7th, 2014. The announcement from Ministry of Finance said that sealed biddings can be submitted by April 14th, 2014. It was revealed that government has decided to accept the spectrum fee and bank guarantees in Pakistani rupees instead of dollars. Moreover, operators will be offered more time to meet rollout obligations. It was also decided that no-new license will be issued with the spectrum auction and operators will continue to operate under previous licenses. However, license fee and other obligations are likely to remain the same. More details about the decisions taken in the meeting are going to surface through revised IM, that is likely to get released by March 17th, 2014.