The Minister of Finance announced today that the auction for the sale of the lots they will operate 5G networks represents a factor for increasing the budget for 2018. The budget for 2018, in the rectified version today, has 15 billion LEI in addition to revenues and licenses for 5G networks are mentioned as one of the factors for increasing revenues, although it is not said in what share of the total.
Romanian mobile operators had already announced that they want to launch 5G networks in our country as early as 2020, so the purchase of licenses in 2019 is the first step towards its official launch. Ionut Misa, the Minister of Finance, avoided providing data on the money that the 5G frequency licenses will bring because the auction leaves room for an unknown evolution of prices, but there are probably expectations for several hundred million LEI.
Romania is just one of the countries where 5G networks will appear in the coming years, with mobile operators investing considerable sums to turn their projects into reality. We are talking here about an increase in Internet browsing speeds to over 1 Gbps, about lower latencies for data transfer and new opportunities for interconnection and remote control.
Orange, Telekom, Vodafone and Digi Mobil are preparing 5G networks at the moment, but it is difficult to say when each one is preparing to launch its own infrastructure. If I had to guess, I would say that by the middle of next year we will know which 5G frequencies the operators have bought and when they intend to launch the 5G networks in our country, everything also depends on the plans of the authorities.
"The fiscal relaxation led to an increase in the share of total revenues in GDP from 29,4% in 2016 to 30,5% in 2017, which will reach 31,7% in 2018. Budget revenues will also increase because we have scheduled the sale of heavy water, but also the auctions for 5G technology licenses. And when estimating the increase in VAT, we took into account the improvement of collection, but also the fact that from the middle of the year we will have electronic cash registers. In addition, the receipts administered by ANAF are on an upward trend."
