Vésper CEO Luiz Kaufmann says the CLEC won?t be able to continue operating either wireline or wireless services if Anatel reverses the decision to turn down Vésper?s application to use its PCS licenses at 1900 MHz instead of 1800 MHz. Vésper filed an appeal Thursday, January 30, asking Anatel?s private service department to reconsider the ban on use of 1900 MHz by Vésper for PCS in the states of São Paulo (except the metropolitan area), Minas Gerais and six Northeastern states. According to Luiz Kaufmann, the fixed wireless service offered by Vésper using WLL in the 1900 MHz band hasn?t yet turned a profit and the controlling shareholder (U.S.-based QualComm) isn?t prepared to continue investing in the operation unless the network can be used for mobile wireless as well, even though when they acquired the PCS licenses they knew the rules stipulate 1800 MHz as the primary band. He says Vésper will wait to see whether Anatel?s board accepts the appeal. If the ban isn?t lifted, it will seek a judicial review.
?This insistence on banning the use of 1900 MHz for wireless contradicts Anatel?s own earlier specification that PCS could make secondary use of this spectrum segment,? Luiz Kaufmann argues, alluding to Resolution 314, Chapter II, article 2. In dealing with spectrum use, the provision clearly allows secondary use by wireless services of frequencies in the 1895 MHz-1910 MHz and 1975 MHz-1990 MHz bands. If Vésper is allowed to operate at 1900 MHz, it will invest 300 million US Dollars in the first year of PCS operations, to expand coverage and upgrade its network with the CDMA 1xRTT broadband data transmission system.
