RCS-RDS, one of the major players in the local mobile telephony market, said it considers expanding in the Hungarian telephony industry, by participating in the bid for two mobile telecommunication licenses, according to Alexandru Oprea, CEO of the company.
“We intend on participating in the bid for the mobile telecommunication licenses in Hungary, which will last for ten days. We also plan to maintain the offers in Romania also for the clients in Hungary; and we will pursue the same concept of being accessible to our clients. We will bid for both licenses on sale,” said Alexandru Oprea, managing director of RDS&RCS.
According to him, the company has the required funds to set up a new network in Hungary.
The licenses are for 450 MHz frequency CDMA and for a full mobile service of 900/1800/2100 (2100 frequency 3G) megahertz frequency package.
12 companies signed up for the race, and the minimum fee for a license is 100 million forints (370,000 euros) plus 0.75% share of annual after-tax earnings. In Romania, the operators paid 35 million US dollars for the issuing of radio bandwidth by the Ministry of Defense and haven’t paid anything for the license tax.
The winner of the tender for license that encloses GSM and 3G frequencies will have to start operating within two years and to report a minimum 35% coverage within three years since the assignment of the licenses.
As for CDMA services, the winner will have to acquire a 30% coverage in three years since the assignment of the license.
Other competitors in the Hungarian market are Pannon GSM Telecommunications, Magyar Telekom Plc (T-Mobile Hungary) and Vodafone Hungary Ltd, while the penetration rate of the mobile telecommunication industry is 116.4% while the penetration rate for mobile broadband is 40%.
RDS&RCS provides mobile telephony services for clients in Romania
