12 Feb 2016

Ofcom BRIG meeting: The need for evidence

The UHF strategic review, the possible release of Home Office spectrum and the future introduction of LTE into the 450-470 MHz band were touched on at the Ofcom Business Radio Interest Group (BRIG) meeting. Land Mobile reports.

The pace of construction in London has led to congestion and is a challenge for network planner; Credit: iStock/melaniekjones

Kevin Delaney, spectrum policy and planning manager at Ofcom, kicked off his part of the discussion by commenting on Ofcom’s thinking on the UHF Strategic Review. “We’re are very cautious on this. We’ve seen the numbers for the amount of stakeholders in this area and the thought that if we go down a particular route we might be inconveniencing [them] attracts a certain amount of nervousness,” he says. “I think what unnerves us is the lack of hard evidence. We can say how many assignments we have in UHF1 or UHF2 but market demand, future trends and technologies appear to be where we are tripping up slightly.

“Ofcom is questioning why a particular industry or a particular segment has to be in UHF. Is it because they’ve always been there or is it that’s all the manufacturers produce? They might produce [the equipment] on a European or global scale in that frequency range.”