Global 5G spectrum prices operators wise
Global 5G spectrum Price Compared with India
Some claim that India’s 5G spectrum price in terms of $/MHz/Population is the lowest in the world. Though this claim is almost true (barring Germany), but this metric cannot be used to measure the spectrum valuation of countries with vastly dissimilar financial structures. The reason is simple – The paying capacity of most Indians is far below that of its global counterparts whose price has been used as a reference. Therefore, India’s high population does not translate into proportionate revenues – resulting in lower cash flows for mobile operators. Hence, instead of using $/MHz/PoP, one should actually use $/MHz/Revenue for comparing spectrum price across markets. Please see the table above, which compares global 5G prices with that of India using both $/MHz/PoP and $/MHz/Revenue.
While making this comparison, I have used the following assumption. A) Total mobile wireless revenue for countries have been extracted from the GSMA database. B) While doing so it has been assumed that the non-recurring revenues from the sale of handset and equipment are 30% of the total wireless revenue. C)This value has been deducted from the total wireless revenue of the respective country from enabling apples to apple comparison with India (Indian operators do not have such revenues). D) The $/MHz/Rev value used for comparison has been also adjusted with the license duration, as these are different across countries.
Global 5G spectrum Price Compared with India using GDP PPP
Please note that the conclusion does not change much.