700MHz trials to begin later this year

Colombia’s National Spectrum Agency (ANE) has announced that trials of 700MHz Long Term Evolution (LTE) technology will begin later this year and confirmed plans to auction 700MHz spectrum licences in 2013. BN Americas reports that Chinese Vendor Huawei will begin trialling the platform in Q4 2012, whilst ZTE and Ericsson will conduct further tests in Q1 2013. As previously reported by CommsUpdate, Colombia has repeatedly delayed the auction of 4G spectrum in higher frequency bands, most recently postponing the tender from September to December 2012. In August this year ANE revealed plans to sell off the following sets of frequencies: 2575MHz-2615MHz; 1710MHz-1755MHz paired with 2110MHz-2155MHz; 2525MHz-2570MHz paired with 2645MHz-2690MHz; and 1865MHz-1867.5MHz paired with 1945MHz-1947.5MHz.