Globe trials use of TV white space for broadband

The Philippines’ Globe Telecom has become the first operator in the nation to pilot using TV white space frequency for mobile broadband.

The operator is collaborating with the ICT office of the Department of Science and Technology to trial use of the spectrum for broadband service delivery in multiple areas of the Philippines.

Globe senior vice president for network technologies strategy Emmanuel Estrada said building additional cell sites to meet demand has proven to be a major challenge, with construction of a single site typically involving around 25 permits and at least 8 months of lead time.

“We hope that making use of available spectrum would enhance bandwidth capacities and allow our network to transmit enormous amount of data at faster speeds,” he said.

Estrada added that TV white space technology is also expected to help Globe roll out broadband to rural areas with low population density, where it is not economically viable to used fixed broadband technology.

TV white spaces are the unused frequencies between UHF and VHF broadcast TV channels, located in the range of 54-MHz to 806-MHz. The long range and strong signal penetration of these frequencies make them well suited to telecoms services.