The wrangling that has delayed the 4G auction in the UK continues, and within days of Ofcom announcing that Everything Everywhere would be allowed to use its 1800 MHz spectrum to launch a 4G network from 11th September, O2 has has apparently written to the Competition Appeals Tribunal.
The current 4G auction is expected to see services starting to be offered in the middle of 2013, so the few months head start would help Everything Everywhere gain a foot hold. The question that Ofcom looked at was whether this head start would unfairly favour Everything Everywhere, and Ofcom decided that it would only create a short term advantage.
The legal wrangles if the O2 letter does result in delays to the T-Mobile/Orange roll-out is that thier parent company Everything Everywhere is likely to raise objections about the rules governing the Ofcom ran 4G auction. Thus there is a possibility that this important auction could get pushed even further back.
On a slightly more upbeat note, apparently the HTC One XL has been announced as Everything Everywhere's first 4G handset. The phone which is effectively a copy of the HTC One X but with a dual-core processor rather than a quad-core due to the space requirements of fitting the 4G circuitry into case, supports 1800 MHz and 2600 MHz LTE frequencies.
I don't see how Ofcom can let anyone launch 4G before the auction takes place, so pleased O2 have appealed.
Any company offering 4G services early would have a significant advantage in attracting customers from their competitors and given the contract lengths customers would be signing the advantage could not be called short term - most signing up initially would be in contract for 24 months.