Ljubljana - The Agency for Communication Networks and Services has received four bids for wireless spectrum, including bands set aside for 5G mobile networks, until the deadline last Monday and now the battle of operators for their slice of the 5G pie begins. But the operators are in for at least two more steps entailing substantial investments, Delo says.

The winners of the auction are expected to be known by summer but that will mark only the beginning of investments for the operators.

The next step will be building infrastructure and base stations, which will be costly, Delo says.

Then comes the end user of the 5G mobile technology. The potential of the technology is huge and many solutions and services are still unknown.

The business sector in particular is counting on many benefits, especially the sector for autonomous vehicles, smart automation of production; the internet of things is to get a push as well as distance healthcare.

Operators are promising all this to users mainly because of faster connection and better response time, but the question is whether users will be willing to buy notably costlier mobile devices merely to have music and videos downloaded faster.

Delo believes they would be much more attracted to some innovative services, for example virtual reality. If the operators fail to persuade users at this point this they will end up having to pay for the mobile devices too, warns the paper under the headline Auction of 5G Frequencies to be Followed by a Mountain of Investments.