- Accelerating Project for Free Wi-Fi Internet Access at Public Places in Philippines -

The National Institute of Information and Communications Technology of Japan (NICT, President: Dr. Masao Sakauchi) and the Information and Communications Technology Office of the Philippines (ICTO (*1), Executive Director: Louis Napoleon C. Casambre) announced on May 7 that they have concluded a license agreement to provide NICT's TV White Space (*2) technologies for ICTO. ICTO is planning to deploy Free Wi-Fi Internet Access at Public Places (*3) in the Philippines and expecting the TV White Space as an effective frequency band for wireless networking at the project. NICT will further cooperate with ICTO in implementing the TV White Space technologies required for the project, based on the MOU between NICT and ICTO.

-- ICTO of the Philippines is planning to deploy free Wi-Fi Internet access at public places.

-- ICTO is focusing on utilization of TV White Space for the project.

-- Both have signed a license agreement to provide ICTO with NICT's TV White Space technology.

- Background

ICTO of the Philippines is promoting a project to deploy wireless network infrastructure to provide free Wi-Fi Internet access in public places all over the country. ICTO has decided to utilize White Spaces in the TV band for wireless networking in the project particularly for underserved and unserved areas. In utilizing TV White Space, it is crucial to operate equipment carefully so as not to interfere with TV broadcastings. To avoid such interference, the White Space Database (WSDB) (*4) is needed for analyzing available TV channels at each location. Meanwhile, NICT has been developing WSDBs which satisfy the regulations of some different countries around the world for the purpose of technical evaluations, since the WSDB is regarded as one of the essential technologies to utilize the TV White Space. In response to the request from ICTO, NICT signed an MOU with ICTO in March 2015. Since then, both have engaged a series of discussions aiming to exploit NICT's WSDB technologies for free Wi-Fi Internet access in public places.

- Achievements

NICT and ICTO have concluded a license agreement, providing ICTO with the WSDB developed by NICT. This WSDB stores all the TV broadcasting information and calculates the broadcasting areas, according to the geography of the Philippines. The WSDB is capable of listing up TV channels which are available for operating equipment at specified locations. In the future, it is expected that the equipment sends its location to the WSDB, the WSDB sends back available channels to the equipment, and the equipment automatically starts operation in the TV White Space. The Philippines has started terrestrial TV broadcasting services since February 2015 using the ISDB-T system developed in Japan. Accordingly, the WSDB also supports the radio propagation model for the ISDB-T system that is used in Japan to calculate TV broadcasting areas.

- Future perspectives

NICT will continuously cooperate with ICTO by providing TV White Space technologies required to conduct the ICTO's project based on the MOU between NICT and ICTO. For the use of TV White Space, it is necessary that systems should be operated carefully depending on the circumstances of each country. NICT will continue R&D on TV White Space technologies so that they are flexibly applicable to various requirements.

NOTE: ICTO is planning to demonstrate the WSDB at the Global Summit 2015 hosted by Dynamic Spectrum Alliance on May 6-8, 2015. For the details of the Global Summit 2015, please see the following URL: http://www.dynamicspectrumalliance.org/summit.html