French operator Iliad has seen its full-year profit decline by more than a quarter in 2012. The firm posted profit of €186.5m, down from €251.8m in 2011, despite revenues increasing almost 50 per cent.
French low-cost 3G operator Free has managed to acquire nearly four per cent of the country’s market share in just 80 days.
Orange France’s VP of wholesale, Brigitte Bourgoin, has sent a letter to Iliad CEO Maxime Lombardini complaining of the strain that its subsidiary Free Mobile is putting on its network.
French regulator Arcep has said that it has awarded 4G licences in the 800Mhz band to the incumbent operators Bouygues, Orange and SFR. Fourth applicant Free Mobile, owned by Iliad, was not successful. All four operators were previously awarded 4G licences at 2.6GHz.
French regulator Arcep has announced that all four of the country’s major operators have won licences to use its 2.6 GHz frequency band, which will be used in the deployment of LTE mobile networks. Orange/France Telecom will be allocated a duplex frequency block of 20 MHz, for which it bid €287.12m, while Iliad’s Free Mobile will also be allocated the same, after bidding €271m.
France’s Conseil d’Etat (Council of State)has rejected a bid by mobile operator Iliad to stop the government’s auction of 4G mobile licences. The company had petitioned the court for an emergency injunction to halt the auction, ahead of its September 15 launch date, saying it was not fair to all telecom operators.
French telecoms regulator ARCEP has said that the country’s LTE spectrum auction will be launched before May this year. The terms of the sale, which is expected to raise €2bn, are expected to be finalised shortly and ARCEP has said that it wants to award the spectrum before the end of this year.
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