3.5GHz band to be available for 5G in further 236 municipalities

This is a machine translation of Anatel's press release

From May 27, 2024, providers that acquired lots in the 3.5 GHz band will be able to request Anatel to license and activate 5G stations in this band in a further 236 municipalities, according to a deliberation held this Wednesday, in Ordinary Meeting of the Monitoring Group for the Implementation of Solutions for Interference Problems in the 3,625 to 3,700 MHz band (Gaispi).

With the decision, there will be 4,134 municipalities with the 3.5 GHz band available for use by stations of the fifth generation's standalone mobile service, in which over 189 million Brazilians live - approximately 88.6% of the country's population.

To facilitate monitoring of released municipalities, Gaispi provides a data panel showing the municipalities in which the 3.5 GHz band is already released and also the planning approved by the Group for the next releases.

It is important to highlight that the release of the band does not mean that 5G networks will be installed immediately in the locations: the early installation of fifth generation stations in these cities depends on the individual planning of each provider.

The decision taken by Gaispi follows guidelines from the 5G notice and covers municipalities in which the 3.5 GHz Band Administrative Entity (EAF) began the migration of free and open television signal reception through parabolic antennas in the satellite C band for the Ku band and completed the necessary actions to vacate this band by Fixed Satellite Service (FSS) systems, having installed filters to mitigate interference in all impacted FSS stations.

EAF is the non-governmental and non-profit entity created by Anatel to support the lower-income population in replacing old satellite dishes with new digital satellite dishes, completely free of charge.

With the anticipation of these 236 (two hundred and thirty-six) municipalities, the States of Paraíba (PB), Rondônia (RO) and Tocantins (TO) are fully authorized for the activation of 5G stations in the 3.5 GHz band. With this release are 15 UFs (AL, AP, DF, ES, MA, PB, PR, RJ, RO, RR, RS, SC, SE, SP and TO) with all municipalities released.

Anyone who receives Open TV broadcasts via a satellite dish needs to adapt the equipment to avoid possible interference. Those registered in the Single Registry for Social Programs of the Federal Government (CadÚnico) who receive a satellite TV signal can request a free kit to adapt the equipment to Siga Antenado , the trade name of the EAF.

It is worth noting that in April the EAF reached the milestone of more than 2.5 million open TV reception kits in the Ku band distributed since the beginning of activities, having the capacity to install around 10 thousand kits per day.

It is essential that the eligible interested party schedules the installation of new equipment. More information is available on the Siga Antenado website. Telephone number 0800-729-2404 is also available.

The municipalities with the band already released, the cities, neighborhoods and the number of licensed 5G standalone stations in the 3.5 GHz band, as well as the cell phones certified for 5G use, can be consulted in the dashboards available on the dashboard. Anatel data:

https://informacoes.anatel.gov.br/paineis/espectro-e-orbita/gaispi-liberacao-e-planejamento-3-5-ghz

https://informacoes.anatel.gov.br/paineis/outorga-e-licenciamento/estacoes-do-smp

https://informacoes.anatel.gov.br/paineis/certificacao-de-produtos/celulares-em-5g