Availability of Private 5G Spectrum in Switzerland

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Switzerland’s Federal Office of Communications (BAKOM - OFCOM in English), the Swiss telecoms regulator has made spectrum available for private 5G. It was announced last year but the spectrum has been available from 01 Jan 2024. English form is available here.

Quoting from Mobile Europe:

The new radio licences will be allocated in the 3400-3500 MHz range with 10MHz as the minimum lease and will only cover a limited and clearly defined area, preventing metro-size deployments. If several licence applications are submitted in the same area, the frequency resources may be divided between the applicants. 

The cost for the licences will be CHF48/MHz/year meaning the minimum cost will be CHF480 per campus. 

However, unlike other jurisdictions, the Swiss Government has not opted for a cost/square km meaning that, as it stands, a small enterprise would cost the same as a large manufacturing facility or airport.  

Are part of the licence conditions, campus network frequencies can only be used for terrestrial networks and not satellite. They also can’t be used to provide telecommunication services to third parties. 

To help manage potential interference issues, EIRP of 6 Watts must not be exceeded for transmitters. The field strengths permitted at the border of a campus network will be specified in each concession. 

And while the final decision on the exact duration of frequency ownership is still pending, the frequencies will be allocated for several years.  

The design of the regulatory and technical framework for campus networks is still ongoing in Switzerland and will be completed in the course of 2023. 

This availability of spectrum adds to the long list of countries making innovation in private 5G possible with the availability of dedicated spectrum, as can be seen in the image from Qualcomm in the Tweet above.

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