Peter Bury, the regulator's director of strategic resources, said on Wednesday at the Wireless Event in London that the auction of 192MHz of spectrum, situated around the frequency of 2.6GHz, would happen in the first quarter of next year. The terms for the auction will be published in October or November of this year.

The spectrum in question is highly contentious as it could be used for WiMax, a long-range, high-bandwidth wireless broadband technology which has thus far failed to gain a significant foothold in western Europe due to spectrum availability issues. However, the spectrum could also be used as an expansion band for 3G and its descendent technologies (such as the as-yet-undefined 4G), which also represent a type of wireless broadband. Ofcom's firm stance is one of technology neutrality, which represents a break from the old days of mandating that a certain frequency can only be used for a certain technology.

"Our belief is that wireless service providers may well find that broadband is an opportunity for them," said Bury. "We don't have an opinion on which technology will be successful. We wish them all well." Bury did however concede that, due to falling DSL prices in the UK, it would probably be "tough for wireless solutions to match those kinds of prices". He added that wireless broadband was flourishing in the UK in the public access market, where the country is — globally — second only to Ireland in terms of hotspot penetration.