Incumbent telcos vehemently oppose IDA’s newcomer subsidy plan

Increased competition will impact customer experience.

Singapore’s three ruling telcos rejected the Infocomm Development Authority’s (IDA) proposal to introduce a heavily discounted package of frequencies for a would-be fourth mobile operator.

A report by BMI Research said that SingTel, StarHub and M1 cautioned that the introduction of competition would lead to a poorer consumer experience as there would not be adequate spectrum to serve each operator's bandwidth requirements.

The three operators also rejected the requirement for a fourth network operator in response to the regulator's call for feedback on its proposal.

M1, in particular, has also requested the regulator to allow the incumbents to retain their rights to use the 900MHZ brand 'to meet IDA's stringent 3G standards'.