Mr. Marcus Matthews:

A lot of it is fixed wireless but it could also include home wireless, external Wi-Fi points and a significant number of different applications and technologies. The 700 MHz band, which is a low spectrum band, is coming up for consideration, not just in Ireland but in several other countries. I believe ComReg is part of a group from different countries, which is looking at this and how to reassign it. Almost any household name, such as Microsoft or Google, or any company interested in deepening and advancing connectivity globally to parts of the world that do not have it, advocate that the 700 MHz band should be allocated to fixed wireless technology. It is the last opportunity in the low-band spectrum for fixed wireless to get an opportunity to deliver services. This is a band for which there needs to be an econometric assessment. Does it make sense to get a couple of million up euro front? The committee must be aware that the economic figures used in the procurement process for the NBP to justify the approach for fixed wireless providers are from 1990. It is that far out of date because official bodies have not gone to get the information from regional ISPs and crunched the numbers. We are basing these significant economic decisions on data that are ridiculously out of date.