The government of Argentina said the decision to allocate the 6 Ghz for Wi-Fi 6 will enable this technology to be available for universities, large industrial factories and also for residential users

The Argentine government confirmed it will allocate the entire 6 GHz band to promote the adoption of Wi-Fi 6 technology in the country.

The announcement was made by the country’s Economy Minister Sergio Massa and the head of telecom regulator Enacom, Claudio Ambrosini, during a press conference.

Representatives of Meta, Intel, Google, Cisco, Qualcomm, Federated Wireless and other technology companies that backed the government’s decision were also present.

With this decision, services providers will be able to provide Wi-Fi services without the need to apply for licenses in the 5.92-7.12 GHz spectrum range.

“Wi-Fi 6 allows competitiveness for regional economies, but also competitiveness for those who, due to talent and capacity, can offer services to the world from different regions of the country. Sometimes they compete in disadvantage by what we call latency,” said Economy Minister Sergio Massa.

“The higher the level of Wi-Fi capillarity, and in this sense Wi-Fi 6 is full capillarity throughout the national territory, the higher the level of participation of our SME ecosystem and our individual developers, the higher the level of speed and volume in the speed, in the transfer of speed and volume of data in the home Internet, greater possibility of development of the Internet of Things, of the metaverse, of the capacity to provide economic services abroad, which is one of the great potential of the Argentine economy”, the minister concluded.

Meanwhile, Ambrosini said that with the decision to allocate these frequencies for Wi-Fi 6, this technology will be available for universities, large industrial factories and also for residential users.

The decision by the Argentine government is in line with the approach previously adopted by other Latin American countries such as Brazil, Colombia and Peru.

However, the decision goes against the position of telecommunications operators who were in favor of the idea of a balanced allocation, which contemplated the needs of licensed use of this band.

The GSMA had recently highlighted the relevance of the 6 GHz band for the development of mobile services. “5G networks will need 2 gigahertz of spectrum in mid-bands over the next decade to realize their full capabilities. This band [6 Ghz] can be a key piece to meet the demand,” the entity said in a statement.

The government recently confirmed that it aims to award spectrum in the 3.5 GHz for 5G technology. Local operators have been carrying out 5G trials in certain cities of the country using DSS sharing technology, which enables the provision of 5G services via 4G networks.