Partners, the bidding vehicle used by Novator Partners – the Icelandic-owned, London-based owner of Chilean upstart operator WOM – has asked Colombia’s Ministry of Information Technologies and Communications (Ministerio de Tecnologias de la Informacion y las Comunicaciones, MinTIC) to retract one of its offers in last month’s spectrum auction, after accidentally entering a bid ten times higher than the going rate.
As per MinTIC bidding documents, the newcomer mistakenly entered a bid of COP1.748 trillion (USD534.2 million) for Block 2 in the 2500MHz band, well ahead of its bids for Block 5 (COP293.2 billion) and Block 6 (COP173.5 billion). Partners seeks to have the higher bid removed from the auction proceedings, but the other 2500MHz blocks are unaffected by the request.
A statement issued by the MinTIC on 3 January confirmed: ‘The operator indicates that there is an inconsistency in the value offered in one of the blocks and incurred in error … the MinTIC, in the light of the rules established in the auction, and the regulations in force, will study the application and will decide on it in the coming weeks.’