Ofcom announces companies who have been qualified to bid for GSM Guard Band licenses

The following companies have been qualified to bid for the award of spectrum in the bands 1781.7-1785MHz paired with 1876.7-1880MHz.

British Telecommunications PLC
Cable & Wireless UK (England)
Centric Telecom Ltd
COLT Mobile Telecommunications Ltd
Cyberpress Ltd
FMS Solutions Ltd
Mapesbury Communications Ltd
ntl Group Limited
02 (UK) Ltd
Opal Telecom Ltd
Orange Personal Communications Services Ltd
PLDT (UK) Ltd
Shyam Telecom UK Ltd
Spring Mobil AB
Teleware PLC
Zynetix Ltd

That gives 16 potential bidders for between 7 and 12 licenses. However there are some big players (BT, C&W, Colt, NTL, O2, Carphone Warehouse [Opal], Orange, PLDT) which potentially means that there will be at least 8 least 8 gone, maybe leaving 4 license between the 8 smaller players.

The minimum bid is £50,000, but it's expected that licenses will go for at leats 6 figures.

Oddly Coffee Telecom who have been extremely vocal about running GSM services and bidding for a license and potentially trying to land grab even before the applications closed, don't seem to be in the list.