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All 5 Applications in the Auction for Awarding Digital Television Multiplexes Admitted to the Next Stage

20.01.2015

 
The auction commission within ANCOM announces that all the five companies which submitted applications in the auction held for awarding the digital television multiplexes - 2K Telecom, Radio M Plus, Regal, Cargo Sped and Digital Video Broadcast - are qualified for the next stage. Upon analysing the submitted applications, the auction commission assessed the fulfilment of all the qualification criteria. Two national, 40 regional and 19 local multiplexes are auctioned out in this competitive selection procedure.
The auction commission will announce the winning offers following this first stage and whether bidding rounds are necessary by the end of this month.
The competitive selection procedure for the awarding of multiplexes requires that each bidder submit an initial bid, indicating the categories and the number of multiplexes it wishes to purchase. If the demand exceeds the number of available multiplexes, the auction may continue with primary rounds for the multiplexes where the demand exceeds the supply. For the remaining categories, the winners will be designated based on the initial bid. Once the winners and the prices of all the wanted multiplexes established, the auction will continue with an allocation round during which the multiplexes will be awarded to the winning bidders based on the additional amounts they are willing to pay in order to acquire a certain frequency allocation.
All the multiplexes will be granted for a 10-year period and the winners will be able to start the provision of commercial television broadcasting services as of 17 June 2015. By 1 May 2017, the winners of the two national multiplexes will have to put into operation at least 36 transmitters, whereas the winners of the regional or local multiplexes will have to launch into operation at least one transmitter in each assignment area.
National multiplexes will cover the whole country with digital terrestrial television services, whereas each of the regional and local multiplexes will serve specific allotment, which may cover one county or one locality.
The minimum licence fee, i.e. the starting price within the auction, for each of the two national multiplexes is EUR300,000, whereas the one for the regional and the local multiplexes ranges between EUR12,000 for a regional multiplex in Bucharest and EUR1,000 for a multiplex allotted within a locality that is not a county capital.
A digital multiplex is a group of radio broadcasting and television programmes, additional multimedia services and other associated identification data transmitted from the emission stations to the end-users by terrestrial radio means, using digital modulation within the limits of a standard television channel/frequency block.