Preparation for The Telecommunications Law

CTT has always paid attention to global telecommunications industry development. In response to 5G technological development trends, preparatory work for 5G spectrum resources was initiated in 2018. 5G spectrum planning was completed in December of that year, and CTT coordinated with the local mobile operators to perform 5G network technical testing in phases. In April 2019, CTT amended the mobile licences to permit mobile operators to choose whether or not to operate their 2G (GSM) network and services according to its commercial merits. The mobile operators have completely ceased their 2G network and services in November 2019. The government may reallocate the corresponding spectrum for 5G networks, thus increasing overall spectrum efficiency.

On the other hand, CTT completed the consultation draft of the Telecommunications Network and Service Convergence Framework in early 2019. A 30-day industry consultation was held from 1^st February to 4^th March of that year to brainstorm and collect ideas from industry, create policy more beneficial to the telecommunications industry’s sustainable and healthy development, as well as create conditions for introducing convergent services and more advanced communications technology, such as 5G.

After thorough consideration of the collected ideas, CTT amended the articles in Telecommunications Network and Service Convergence Framework and renamed it to Telecommunications Law. This piece of legislation is currently undergoing the legislative process, and we endeavour to have it come into effect within 2020.

The deployment of this framework will bring more development opportunities to the industry and enable operators to provide more diverse telecommunications services. Under this new framework, it is believed that more competition in the telecommunications market is fostered, more diversification of telecommunications services is promoted, and prices will be more reasonable.

Nevertheless, after considering that it might take time to promulgate the legislation of Telecommunications Law and in view of the development of 5G in recent years, MSAR government finally decided to launch a public tender for the issuance of 5G licenses through Regulamento Administrativo No. 7/2002 “Regulation on the operation of public telecommunication networks and the provision of public mobile telecommunication services” in June 2022. This moves not only in line with national policy, it is also an important measure for Macao to accelerate its integration into the development of Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, and to meet with users’ demand on 5G local and roaming services. A total of two tenders were received from operators, and the whole tendering process went smooth. In 7^th November 2022, the government of MSAR granted 5G licenses to CTM and China Telecom respectively.

For details of the above 5G licenses, please refer to the License No. 1/2022 and No. 2/2022 in the following webpage:

https://telecommunications.ctt.gov.mo/en/IndustrialInfo/License#mobile