Bulgaria Cancels GSM License Tender

Bulgaria's telecoms regulator, the Communications Regulation Commission (CRC) has decided to annul the process for awarding the country's fourth GSM license after the sole bidder failed to submit their paperwork in time. Although twelve companies initially indicated an interest in the license and eight brought the tender documents, only one company - Liechtenstein based TelCo actually submitted a tender.

Due to the single bidder, the auction was cancelled and the license automatically awarded to TelCo - subject to paperwork being completed. The regulator says that the initial submission was incomplete and it granted TelCo a further seven days to resubmit their application. As the company failed to comply, the regulator issued a statement confirming that the process had been cancelled.

Eight companies had formally expressed an interest in the license, but there had been concerns that the reserve price was too high. The minimum bid was set at BGN38 million (US$30.2 million) and there was a minimum deposit of BGN 1.9 billion required to enter the auction. Local telecoms operator, Max Telecom had publicly stated that the price was far too high and the license period too long for such a fast moving industry.

The regulator has not said what it plans to do with the radio spectrum - although most other countries facing a failed license tender generally seem to farm the spectrum out to the incumbent operators to boost their network capacity.

The country already has four operators - although only three are operational, and according to figures from the Mobile World database, their market shares are: Globul (38%), MobilTEL (51%), Globul (38%) and BTC Mobile (10%). The market itself is saturated with a population penetration level which reaches 137%.

On the web: Communications Regulation Commission - Mobile World

Posted to the site on 6th August 2008