Goodbye to areas without mobile coverage: we will have a minimum of 30 megabytes throughout Spain

The ultimate goal of this aid is to provide mobile communications network coverage in remote and low-density areas in the coming years. where there is no 4G mobile coverage with a minimum service of 10 Mbps downstream and 3 Mbps upstream, so as to reduce or eliminate the digital gap between profitable and unprofitable areas where mobile network deployments can be carried out.

150 million euros in aid

This program has a total of 150 million euros in aid. As published in the Official State Gazette, as part of the Spain Digital 2025 Agenda, a series of objectives have been set for the continuation of the deployment of 5G in Spanish territory, the ultimate goal of which is to have 100% 5G mobile coverage for that year, since it is considered key to «increased economic productivity, social progress and territorial structure».

5G

These grants will be in the form of Grants to be awarded between now and next year, intended, among other infrastructure modernization objectives, for the deployment of the set of passive infrastructures necessary for the provision of mobile communications services in the areas in which it has been identified that they do not meet the aforementioned minimums. The financed passive infrastructures will facilitate the provision of mobile broadband services of at least 30 Mbps.

In the eligible areas, the municipalities and highways in which coverage obligations have been established have been excluded. The physical infrastructure to be built or the physical infrastructure to be adapted includes any element necessary to house the active elements of a network for access to mobile communications services and allow a minimum of four operators of electronic communications services providing service from said infrastructure, together with the necessary backhaul infrastructure, such as:

• Towers, masts or poles.
• Ducts, enclosures or construction elements to house the active equipment of the access networks.
• Power supply systems or connection networks to public power networks.
• Infrastructure protection elements and systems.
• Infrastructure access roads.
• The passive elements of a dark fiber deployment that allow a connection with the aggregation network (“backhaul”). In justified cases, the necessary elements for connection with backhaul via point-to-point fixed service radio link.
• Complementary elements, excluding any active element of the mobile communications access network for the end user.

30 megabytes minimum throughout Spain

The passive infrastructures 4G/5G are physical infrastructures to support mobile communications networks, such as towers, masts or poles, conduits, energy supply systems or connection networks to public energy networks or infrastructure protection elements and systems. . These infrastructures must be able to enable it to be provided in said eligible areas. a service of at least 30 Mbps for the downlink and 10 Mbps for the uplinkas well as a maximum latency of 100 ms.

5G

The Program for the Universalization of Digital Infrastructures for Cohesion (UNICO), which serves as a framework for different calls that will facilitate the universalization of access to ultra-fast broadband and the extension of 5G throughout the national territory, is one of the keys to this aid. As part of the European funds allocated after the COVID-19 pandemic, the “Next Generation EU” Recovery Fund was launched, which included a technological modernization that the Government of Spain fit into the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan (PRTR).

Among the ten lever policies contemplated by the PRTR, this action falls under the heading “Digital connectivity, promotion of cybersecurity and deployment of 5G”, whose objectives are the promotion of digital transformation, betting on the deployment of 5G in all territorial areas, thus promoting the disappearance of the digital gap between rural and urban areas.

have been defined four large areas that will allow optimizing the design of the passive infrastructure in each of them to cover the eligible areas of the entire national territory efficiently.

• Zone 1: Galicia, Asturias, Cantabria, Basque Country and Castilla y León.
• Zone 2: Aragon, Catalonia, Foral Community of Navarre and La Rioja.
• Zone 3: Community of Madrid, Castilla-La Mancha, Extremadura and the Canary Islands.
• Zone 4: Andalusia, Valencian Community, Region of Murcia, Balearic Islands, Autonomous City of Ceuta and Autonomous City of Melilla.

Each project that opts for aid must adjust its geographical scope of action to one of the four competition zones, and a single applicant may present a single project for one competition zone. Each applicant can submit one project for each of the four competition zones.