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Alleging
discrimination against broadcasters who
want to enter the field, Zee has said that
if Trai's proposals are carried through,
CMTS or UASL operators can begin the services
immediately, whereas the "terrestrial"
and "satellite" categories need
to wait for a year or more, and this is
because under
Trai's provisions, the terrestrial and satellite
operators have to await release of policy,
conduct of auction, issue of licenses, allocation
of spectrum and WPC clearances.
"This
is expected to take at least over a year.
This is more so as there is no clarity on
the spectrum to be used by DD for its own
services and requirement of other services
which share the same band," Zee has
said.
On
the quantum of license fee, Zee has said
that a major change must be made in the
conditionalities for calculating license
fee.
Trai
has said that the license fee must be 6
per cent of gross revenue or 10 per cent
of the reserve price of one time-entry fee,
whichever is higher.
Broadcasters
argue that the 10 per cent provision must
be removed as it would kill off the broadcasters
before the first year runs out, whereas
here, too, Trai has discriminated in favour
of telcos.
Zee
has shown by a calculation that in the first
year of rolling out, to ensure a good uptake,
subscription fees cannot be kept at more
than Rs 100 per subscriber per year, and
if the 10 per cent clause is retained, the
total revenue for the broadcasters would
be negative.
It
has also said that there is discrimination
at the level of entry itself, as the telcos
would pay a license fee that is four per
cent of the adjusted gross revenue of the
licensee companies.
The
difference, according to Zee's calculation,
is that for the same subscriber base, a
telco would have to pay a license fee of
Rs 7.2 million, but broadcasters would have
to pay Rs 50 million.
In
fact, broadcasters are demanding now that
if Trai has a model for calculating the
license fee at 10 per cent of the reserve
price of one-time entry fee that would still
not kill off a broadcaster entering the
mobile TV field, the regulator should be
transparent and share it with the stakeholders.
Broadcasters are demanding that the license
fee ought to be four per cent of the AGR,
which, too, must be calculated only on licensed
activity and not on revenues from other
sources like interest, rent, dividend and
so forth.
Trai
has mentioned that the CMTS operators can
commence services based on their "existing
spectrum" without requiring any further
license.
However,
Zee says that Trai has been silent on what
the term "existing spectrum" means.
"At
present, as per the CMTS policy, spectrum
is allotted solely on the basis of subscriber-linked
criteria.
"The
subscribers counted are those for voice
services. Those operators who have any excess
spectrum than that required for just meeting
the subscriber-linked requirements are required
to return all excess spectrum, which will
be allotted to new operators," Zee
has said.
It
also argues that hence the concept of "existing
spectrum" or "excess spectrum"
is not in consonance with the policies of
the DOT.
"As
no licensing is required, it is likely that
all CMTS operators will immediately announce
the launch of mobile TV services,"
it says.
Zee has added, "We suggest that the
auction be on a book-building process to
arrive at the price of the highest possible
level at which the spectrum slots can be
sold."
Zee
maintains that all the bids received should
be listed in a descending order and the
lowest level of bid should be determined
at which all spectrum slots (or all licenses
in a given area) are sold.
All
the slots should then be sold at the same
price (i.e. that of the lowest bid) and
the reserve price is the lowest price at
which all licenses are sold. Such methodologies
are followed everywhere in multiple operators
scenario.
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