Digital switchover may speed up mobile broadband

UK mobile broadband users could get a boost from 2012 if frequencies currently used by analogue television channels are reallocated to the web, according to digital television experts.

The analogue signals used for the past 80 years are being phased out during the digital switchover.

The London region will be the last part of the UK to see the old transmissions switched off in 2012. The switchover replaces analogue with digital signals.

The use of digital signals for television broadcast means that a swathe of radio spectrum will become available for other uses.

"Some frequencies will be reallocated to mobile broadband, [although] there could be some interference with [Freeview] services," said Rob Hamlin, Arqiva's strategic development director for terrestrial broadcast, at the Westminster Eforum seminar on the future of digital terrestrial television.

Arqiva provides broadcasting infrastructure including wireless communications.

However, the process of deciding which newly available frequencies are allocated to which uses could become quite a bun fight, as HD and 3D supporters could be lobbying for the same chunks of bandwidth.

This prospect of interference with existing digital channels might count against their allocation to mobile broadband.