Ukraine’s National Commission for the State Regulation of Communications & Informatization (NCCIR) adopted a decision at its meeting of 22 April 2015 on the harmonisation of technical specifications for the conversion of 2100MHz radio frequencies from military use to commercial mobile operators under the recently awarded 3G UMTS licences. The decision was based on a review of the technical specifications submitted by Kyivstar, MTS Ukraine and Astelit, who were announced as the winners of three 2×15MHz licences on 23 February 2015, subsequently paying a total of UAH8.770 billion (USD311 million) in one-off fees for their 15-year concessions. The total cost of the conversion of UMTS frequencies from military use – roughly UAH1.6 billion – is to be divided equally among the winners and added to the basic licence acquisition fee, and at the meeting the NCCIR noted that the three operators were required to inform it of ‘contracting’ the conversion within two months of the announcement of the licence auction results.
