According to the latest figures published by the Agence nationale des fréquences (ANFR), France now has 25,105 authorised 5G sites, of which 14,284 have been declared technically operational by operators.

Up 3.7% over one month, the increase in the number of 5G sites owes much to the legacy of past networks - and especially 4G. The ANFR points out that "almost all of these 5G installations have been authorised on existing sites already used by 2G, 3G or 4G technologies" and that only two mobile sites in France host only 5G.

According to operator statements, 56.9% of the 25,105 5G sites authorised at the end of May are technically operational. The main trends of the deployment carried out in a scattered manner by the operators to date are now emerging.

Free confirms its attraction for the 700 MHz band for accelerated coverage of the territory. 16,683 5G sites are counted in this frequency band, of which 9,584 are declared technically operational.

Bouygues Telecom, Orange and SFR have adopted similar tactics. The three operators rely on the 2.1 GHz band, which is already used for 4G. At the end of May, they had 8,376 authorised 5G sites in this band, with 3,973 declared technically operational.

However, operators are not forgetting about the "queen band" of 5G, the 3.5 GHz band, as they seem determined to move on to this specific 5G band.

The ANFR counted 8,550 authorised 5G sites in this band at the end of May, of which 3,973 were declared technically operational. This bodes well for the further deployment of the new generation of mobile technology.

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Source : ZDnet

Based on an October U.S. report referring to the 3.7-3.9 GHz band used by 5G, the French Civil Aviation Authority (DGAC) is concerned that the first 5G antennas could disrupt guidance systems inside aircraft. Indeed, this would create a "major risk" for aircraft radio altimeters that also rely on these frequencies. This system is the only device on board aircraft to be able to measure their distance from the ground or other obstacles. Philippe Barnola, Deputy Director at the DGAC, specifies that "Complementary technical analyses are underway to ensure the compatibility of these 5G stations with the needs of civil aviation".

And this is particularly disturbing for operators, who explain that they were informed of the problem once the frequencies were paid for. Now they fear delays in the deployment of 5G.

While operators will initially focus on city centers, they fear that they will not be able to cover more or less wide areas around airports in the future. And this could concern cities in some cases, such as those around Roissy or Orly airports.

The operators have therefore decided to write to the Secretary of State for Digital and Electronic Communications. For its part, SFR is threatening not to pay the first installment it owes the State for frequencies. While Bouygues Telecom wants to be compensated "in proportion to these new constraints".

In the office of the Secretary of State, they want to reassure themselves: "In Germany everything is going well, there is no reason why it should be any different in France". The protection zones around airports will be adapted for 5G, for example. Work has also been launched at the European level.

The same applies to the National Frequency Agency (ANFR). "In the end, there will be a delay of a few weeks or even months on a limited number of antennas near airports [...] There will be no sustainable exclusion zones. French airports have 2G, 3G and 4G. They will also have 5G."

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Source : Kulture Geek

Grégory Rabuel, CEO of SFR, announced the launch of the 5G in Nice on the evening of November 20th at BFM Business. Just over 50% of the city will be covered by this new generation mobile network.

While Montpellier, Bordeaux, Nantes, Marseille and Greater Paris will be the next cities to be covered in 5G by the operator, other municipalities are calling for a moratorium on this technology.

SFR also unveiled its commercial offers for the general public and businesses. For their part, Orange and Bouygues Telecom have communicated their offers to the general public but without announcing their coverage plan. Free talked about a launch in "the coming weeks".

While operators have been able to use their 5G frequencies since November 18th, they are still subject to administrative procedures related to technical authorizations to be filed with the ANFR and requests for information from city halls.

However, several mayors who are environmentalists or left-wing mayors, such as in Lille and Grenoble, have declared that they are in favor of a moratorium until the publication of a report from the ANSES, scheduled for spring 2021.

In the capital, the Paris council voted to create a citizens' conference on 5G, while part of the public is wary of the health and environmental effects of electromagnetic waves.

Even though 5G promises to offer up to 10 times faster throughput in the long term; above all, operators are counting on its launch to manage the increase in traffic and avoid saturation of their mobile networks.

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Source : Le Parisien

The Arcep, by putting an end to the call for tenders for 5G frequencies, has just delivered the positioning of operators on the 3.5 GHz band.

Only Free will have spent 3 million euros to secure a central position in the 5G "queen band". Iliad's French subsidiary will have access to 70 MHz of frequencies on a block ranging from 3.64 GHz to 3.71 GHz.

In detail, SFR will have 80 MHz of frequencies on a block ranging from 3.49 GHz to 3.57 GHz, while the 70 MHz of frequencies held by Bouygues Telecom will be located between 3.57 GHz and 3.64 GHz. Finally, Orange, which holds the largest block of frequencies, with 90 MHz of 5G frequencies, will have a block ranging from 3.71 GHz to 3.80 GHz.

During this second phase of the auction, the operators have disbursed a total of 2.78 billion euros. Bouygues Telecom paid 602 million euros to acquire 70 MHz of frequencies in the 3.5 GHz band, as did Free, which added 3 million euros to this sum to benefit from the positioning of its choice. For its part, SFR invested 728 million euros to get its hands on 80 MHz of frequencies, while Orange spent 854 million euros to get its hands on 90 MHz of frequencies in the 3.5 GHz band.

350 million spent by each operator to purchase fixed 50 MHz blocks will be reimbursed "in 15 equal parts over 15 years, the first part upon the award of the frequency license and the other 14 parts on the anniversary date of the award".

The amounts paid by the operators during the auction and positioning phase will be repayable "in four equal parts payable over four years, the first as soon as the authorization to use the frequencies is granted and the other three on the anniversary date of the grant".

"In addition to these sums, a variable annual portion equal to 1% of the revenues generated by the operation of these frequencies will be added to these amounts," said the telecom police officer.

The frequencies will be officially delivered by the Arcep as of November 18th. But operators will still have to wait for the ANFR's approval before they can market their first 5G offers to the general public and professionals, which should take about 10 additional days.

Concerning the marketing of 5G packages, the operators have not yet made their strategies known. In any case, they will have to wait for the approval of the municipalities to officially launch the 5G era among users. If patience is therefore required, operators are already beginning the major maneuvers to lower the cost of their 5G infrastructure.

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Source : ZDNet

On the evening of the second day of the auction, the State is already assured of pocketing at least €2.65 billion for the allocation of 5G frequencies in France.

Organised by Arcep, the auction covers eleven 10 MHz blocks coveted by Bouygues Telecom (Bouygues), Orange, Free (Iliad) and SFR (Altice).

Each of the 10 MHz blocks, put up for sale at a minimum price of €70 million, reached a new price of €114 million on the evening of 30 September. It had already risen to 90 million on the first day of the auction the day before. The Arcep specifies that the process will continue on Thursday.

Having already raised 1.4 billion euros during the non-auction allocation of four 50 MHz blocks - one per operator - the amount reached by the auction guarantees 2.65 billion euros to the State for the moment. Orange is still asking for five blocks, followed by SFR and Bouygues Telecom with three blocks each, then Iliad with just two blocks.

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Source : Challenges

Olivier Roussat, deputy managing director of the Bouygues group, announced that the telecom operator will gradually withdraw cell phone relay antennas manufactured by Huawei. Located in dense areas in France, 3,000 antennas will be affected by 2028. A decision taken at the request of the French government for security reasons of the 5G network.

ndeed, the French National Agency for the Security of Information Systems (Anssi) will grant authorizations to telecom operators to use 5G equipment, including those manufactured by Huawei, for a maximum period of 8 years. When they expire, authorizations to operate Huawei equipment are not expected to be renewed.

As a result, by 2028, the Chinese giant could be completely squeezed out of the French 5G networks.

To anticipate this decision, Bouygues is starting today to withdraw and replace the antennas manufactured by Huawei. This also enables it to limit the financial impact of this decision. Bouygues did not specify which company would replace Huawei.

Olivier Roussat also indicated that discussions were underway with the French authorities to compensate for the ban on Huawei equipment, which is very costly for the French operator. But without saying more. However, he specified that the group had launched several parallel legal proceedings against the French State.

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Source : L'Usine Digitale

The telecoms regulator has published a new timetable for the continuation of the 5G frequency allocation procedure in the 3.5 GHz band. It will therefore be between September 20th and 30th.  Bouygues Telecom, Free, Orange and SFR, which qualified last February following a call for applications, will participate.

At the end of the procedure, they will each obtain a 50 GHz block in return for 350 million euros per head and a number of deployment obligations. In early autumn, the main auction will allow them to complete this first block by winning one or more 10 GHz blocks. This will be followed by an auction to position the resulting frequencies in the 3.4-3.8 GHz section. The Arcep indicates that the final allocation of frequencies will take place "in October or November". Operators will thus be able to market their future 5G packages "by the end of the year".

However, in the end, operators will not be obliged to provide 5G coverage in at least two major cities before the end of 2020. The delay in the procedure has led the telecoms police to lift this obligation accompanying the first 50GHz block. The marketing will be done "at the initiative of the operators" even if the Arcep promises to remain attentive to the conditions of marketing of the new network and the promises of the operators.

The first obligation will therefore be to deploy 5G on at least 3,000 of their sites by the end of 2022. Operators will also have to distilled at least 240 Mb/s on 75 % of their sites into 4G+ by the same deadline.

This is a reminder that the specifications have been drawn up so that the deployment of 5G and 4G coverage of territories go hand in hand. It is also a response to Bouygues Telecom and SFR, who recently balanced the deployment of the 5th generation network against the need to improve 4G coverage in rural areas.

At the same time, Arcep also intends to respond to growing concerns about the environmental impact of digital technology. Within the framework of a new platform called "for a sustainable digital environment", "associations, institutions, operators, digital companies, personalities" are invited to contribute to it during a series of thematic workshops starting on July 9th.

A report by the end of the year will provide an opportunity to take stock of this work and will propose the "first avenues for taking the response to environmental issues further", which the Authority intends to make a "new chapter in regulation".

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Source : DegroupNews

The auction framework for obtaining 5G frequencies has just been formalised by the Government. This framework letter, signed by the Minister for Cohesion of the Territories and the Secretary of State to the Minister of Economy, should enable Arcep to develop the process.


This letter defines in particular the constraints that will weigh on the winning operators. On the one hand, on the wallet side: it is a question of finding a "balance" between making the State's frequency assets grow and preserving the operators' capacity to invest in infrastructure. While both departments agree that "valuation should leave room for network development", they ask that "price is a substantial criterion for allocations".

On the other hand, on the coverage side: the Government warns that "the commercial service will have to be launched from 2020 to cover several cities" in return for the 5G licences awarded.

However, 5G deployment obligations will not be as stringent as those imposed to extend 4G last year throughout the country.


As for companies, the Arcep will have to "ensure that the operators who will benefit from authorisation will enable vertical players to apply for and benefit from 5G services under financial and operational conditions adapted to their needs, including in sparsely populated areas of the territory".

The Government has set the bar high by asking for the best of both worlds. It remains for the Arcep to include all this in the specifications of the 5G auctions scheduled for next autumn.

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Source : DegroupNews

In an interview with the Opinion, the President of the French Telecommunications Regulatory Authority gave an update on the upcoming arrival of 5G, the audiovisual law and the need to modernise European competition law.

For Sébastien Soriano, manufacturers will be at the heart of the 5G award even if they will not be part of the licensing process. Indeed, it is "all the actors of the economy who will in the future be users of networks linked to the Internet of Things (IoT)". But it is up to the Telecom sector to enable this evolution. "Today, operators are focused on standard offers. Their core business is the consumer market, not the corporate market, and the future is certainly there". Especially since companies do not yet seem ready for this frequency. "Last year, the Arcep offered them the possibility of making pilots in 5G, without much success. In the short term, it is therefore not a bad thing to reserve 5G for major telecom operators. Our bet is that they will change the way they work and make tailor-made solutions to meet the needs of companies. They didn't do it with 4G, which is what many large groups complain about". It is possible to imagine that 5G licences could be granted to telecoms operators in return for obligations or commitments to improve their offers to companies. "Tomorrow the Arcep could become an arbitrator in charge of settling disputes between operators and their customers concerning the relevance of the offers of the former to the demands of the latter". Contrary to popular belief, France is not falling behind in 5G. This one is still planned for next year. "The government is in the process of completing its scoping letter. For our part, we will put our draft procedure, including the operator-business relationship, out for consultation at the end of May/beginning of June. By the end of the year, operators will know how many 5G frequencies they each have, their costs and the obligations attached to them".

According to him, the audiovisual sector, in the midst of a transition, will probably no longer control its distribution network in the long term. Just like the car of tomorrow, the television set could be transformed into a voice assistant. "The audiovisual sector must be able to access the 5G services of telecom operators, such as SNCF or Carrefour, and we can even imagine an appropriate obligation for this specific sector and everything related to culture and pluralism [...] All companies must have access to these infrastructures and of course the audiovisual sector. In addition, I think that this would allow this sector to deal more calmly with the question of the future of DTT if it has access to 5G". Having defended the operators in their conflict with TF1 last year, he believes that "it is the big chains that manage to extract value from these negotiations, which raises a question about pluralism. The audiovisual law could provide a framework where we are currently in a purely commercial negotiation. I am confident that the law will provide a framework with flexible, non-discriminatory, reasonable and cost-reflective rules".

Regarding a possible consolidation of Telecom in France, the President of the Arcep is firm. "There is no news on this subject. Arcep's priority is investment [...] We have reached a model in which prices are attractive to the customer and investment capacity is high: these expenses have increased by 37% in three years, to nearly 10 billion euros annually. Why change a model that works? " However, Mr. Soriano considers that this is not enough to resist the Gafa and the takeover of new intermediaries. "In the long run, the end customer may no longer have to deal with the telecom operator. The latter would become a simple supplier of commodities to smartphone manufacturers, who would then take over margins and customer relations. [...] This is a global risk and an additional reason to focus on terminal regulation". For him, competition law could solve this problem provided that it "is part of a clear vision of the economy and globalization. For this to happen, competition law must be adapted to the economy of the 21st century. Today, in a growing number of sectors, the challenge is to concentrate the strike force (market share, data, R&D, rare talents, etc.) to increase scale effects. To meet this challenge, European competition law must be more concerned with innovation". According to the interviewee, there are two possibilities: to make access to structuring innovation platforms non-discriminatory and to ensure that they are openly accessible to the European ecosystem. "The second challenge is to create scale effects to participate in global competition. ...] In a targeted way, competition law must make it possible to find a compromise on these technological and innovation issues".

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Source : L'Opinion