BT mulls bid for mobile broadband radio spectrum

But a move into the mobile arena is not high on its list of priorities

WIll BT bid for mobile radio spectrum?

BT chief executive Ian Livingstone has said that BT will consider bidding in next year's radio spectrum auction.

"You have to look at the terms and conditions involved," he added, but went on to say it was not high on his list of priorities.

The comments were made to Dow Jones Newswires during an interview at BT’s headquarters in London.

Perhaps higher on BT's list of priorities currently are its £2.5bn investment in an optical fibre network to cover around two-thirds of the UK. BT is also grappling with a £6.6bn pensions deficit.

But a move into the mobile arena could prove irresistible to the operator in the long term given the potential revenue from rapidly growing smartphone use.

The radio spectrum auction will be run by UK comms regulator Ofcom, and will see prime mobile broadband frequencies of 800MHz and 2.6GHz up for grabs.

Minister for communications Ed Vaizey said recently that he wanted to see the spectrum auctioned "as soon as possible". The original date set was mid-2011 but this could be moved forwards.

BT currently has a mobile virtual network operation partnership with Vodafone Group, and back in 1999 it launched a mobile arm called BT Cellnet. This was demerged from BT in 2001 after a shareholder vote, and relaunched in 2002 as O2. O2 was acquired by Spanish telecoms giant Telefonica in 2005 for about £18bn.