Argentina’s telecom cooperatives become MVNOs.
Argentina’s two major associations of telecom cooperatives, Cooperativas de Telecomunicaciones (Fecotel) and Federación de Cooperativas del Sur (Fecosur) have decided to enter the mobile telephone market as Mobile Virtual Network Operators (MVNO), although Fecotel may still be interested in bidding for spectrum at the coming auction in the second half of 2010.
In May 2009, Fecosur signed a Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO) agreement with Telecom Personal to offer services over the latter’s infrastructure. Pilot tests began in September 2009. That same month, Fecosur launched a new brand name, Nuestro, to market mobile services.
Under the MVNO agreement, Fecosur is in charge of managing the MVNO licence and the wholesale agreement with Personal. It also coordinates general affairs such as pricing, marketing, and the purchase of handsets and SIM cards. The local cooperatives serve as distribution channels.
Fecotel also undertook to sign an MVNO agreement with Personal, but negotiations took longer and have yet to be finalised.
Fecotel and Fecosur have been endeavouring to enter the mobile market since early 2004. For this purpose, they created a joint company in March 2004, Argentina Comunicaciones SA (ArcomSA), which received a mobile licence in November 2004 to take over Movistar’s excess spectrum as soon as it became available.
In March 2005, ArcomSA had its name changed to Comarcoop, after Fecosur and Fecotel learnt that the Arcom name had been registered by competitors. SeCom’s initial plan was to transfer Movistar’s returned frequencies directly to Comarcoop, free of charge. This idea met with objections from Claro, which pointed out that it had had to pay for its own licence, and that in any case Argentinean regulations required spectrum to be won through competitive auctions.
In accordance with government requirements, technical plans were submitted separately by Fecotel and Fecosur and were approved in July 2007. The regulator awarded Fecotel a mobile telephone licence, and Fecosur an all-inclusive licence, whereby it can offer any kind of telecom service. Since the government awarded the licences separately, the Comarcoop joint venture was abandoned.
To operate a mobile network, however, the cooperatives require at least 10MHz of spectrum, which they hoped to win when Movistar’s returned spectrum becomes available. Fecotel said it would deploy a nationwide backbone, after which each associated cooperative would be responsible for installing the infrastructure necessary to offer mobile telephony in its own area of operation. Fecotel would ensure interconnection and roaming among cooperatives and between the cooperatives and the country’s major mobile operators.
In 2009, tired of waiting for the delayed spectrum auction, Fecosur chose to take another avenue: rather than build its own network, it opted to become an MVNO.
See also:
Argentina – Mobile Market – Overview, Statistics & Forecasts
Argentina – Fixed-Line Market & Infrastructure – Overview, Statistics & Forecasts
Tagged in: Argentina, Latin America (Includes the Caribbean), Regulations & Government Policies, voice
