Sharing is the best way to make LTE roll outs affordable

Heru Sutadi is Commissioner at the Indonesian Telecommunications Authority in the interview for telecoms.com. In Indonesia we started with LTE trials in 2010 but there is still a great focus on 3G.

Q: What business models would you say are best for monetising LTE? 

HS: The best is vendor financing for the equipment as operators have to spend a lot of money on the spectrum fees.

Q: Do you think that VoLTE will have an impact and if so, in what time frame? 

HS: The technology will have an impact on operators and consumers but I am not sure about time frame. Perhaps, it will take around one year from now.

Q:  Do you think that network sharing between operators is necessary to make LTE roll-outs affordable? 

HS: The trend in the future is not only network sharing but also frequency sharing. In Indonesia it’s okay to share networks but not the frequency. Sharing is the best way to make LTE roll outs affordable.

Q:   What are the main challenges you expect to face in the next 12 months? 

HS: We have some challenges with regard to spectrum allocation for LTE. We are still waiting a decision from the government as to which frequency we will be able to use for LTE. We want to use 700 MHZ or 2.6GHz but 700MHz is still being using by analogue TV and this will not be moved to digital until 2018. 2.6GHz is still being using for satellite TV. The other options are the 60MHz of space we have for TD LTE at 2.3GHz or refarming 1800MHz and maybe 900MHz. Moving forward we will need to discuss the standardisation, education and socialisation of consumers and the many regulations.

\\telecoms.com