The True Group will not take part in the auction of the 1800MHz licences, according to a company’s statement yesterday.

The group’s co-president in charge of commercial operations Kittinut Tikawan said that the management had decided that it should not take part in the bidding, given that its existing 55MHz spectrum bandwidth is enough to keep its comparative advantage in the long run.

Moreover, when taking into consideration the starting bid price in the upcoming auction, it believes that the price does not help the bid winners in gaining advantages over other telecom operators in the market.

In addition, True will not join the bid just for the purpose of raising the bid price to an unrealistic high level and to add financial burden on the bid winners.

TrueMove H Universal Communication, which is True Corp’s cellular operator, and the subsidiaries of Advanced Info Service and Total Access Communication picked up a total of five bid documents for 1800MHz licences on May 14, the first day the bid documents were made available to prospective bidders.

They have to submit the application forms on June 15 to participate in the NBTC’s licensing auction, scheduled for August 4.

TMALL BACKS THAI FEST

The Alibaba Group is continuing its commitment to bring high-quality products from Thailand to consumers in China through its support of the Thai Festival in Shanghai 2018 and a three-day online flash sales of Thai food products in collaboration with various Thai government agencies.

Hosted by the Royal Thai Consulate-General in Shanghai from May 18 to 20, the festival aims to promote Thailand’s unique culture including food and entertainment and will feature a first-of-its-kind “durian buffet” for local durian lovers, among other programmes.

Tmall Fresh, the Alibaba-owned fresh food e-commerce platform, together with Juhuasuan, a sales and marketing platform for flash sales under Tmall, will promote Thailand’s premium tropical fruits in the offline event.

In a special on-stage session today, the platforms will share their unique insights into the world of Thailand’s king of fruits – durians, and provide a glimpse of the 120-hour journey of fresh Monthong durians from Thailand’s Chanthaburi province to China, to demonstrate the stringent quality requirements for durians sold through the Tmall platform.