Romanian 3G Operators Meet Rollout Obligations

Romania's telecoms regulator, ANRCTI has published a report which confirms that the country's two newest 3G license holders, RCS&RDS and Zapp have met the initial phases of their 3G rollout obligations. Vodafone and Orange are existing 3G license holders, having been awarded their licenses back in 2005. Cosmote Romania is the sole remaining operator which does not have a 3G licenses.

"The first stage of 3G networks roll-out ended as of June 30, 2008. According to the measurements, the radio signal was assessed at the parameters established by the licence, throughout all the measurement sites, according to the commitments the two operators undertook through their offers. Thus, RCS&RDS covered the population of 176 towns and approximately 2,400 km national roads, whereas Telemobil implemented its network in 19 towns and covered 1,900 km national roads, Dan Georgescu, the President of ANRCTI, declared.

The two 3G operators assumed the obligation to cover, by the end of the first stage, the population of 176 towns and approximately 2,400 km national roads (RCS&RDS), respectively 19 towns and 1,900 km national roads (Telemobil).

At the end of the first stage, June 30, 2008, the Authority initiated on-site measurements using the radio inspection integrated system - RADIS. The measurements were conducted on a representative sample of localities and roads, between July 1 and 20, 2008, and involved 20 ANRCTI specialists.

The second stage will end on December 31, 2009. By this date, RCS&RDS is committed to covering 1,400 km more national roads, whereas Telemobil is to cover 43 towns and 2,000 km more national roads.

According to figures from the Mobile World database, RCS&RDS ended the first quarter of this year with an estimated 310,000 subscribers, while Zapp ended the same period without any WCDMA customers although it had just over 512,000 3G CDMA subscribers from its earlier network rollout.

Posted to the site on 29th July 2008