In January last year, the government .

The advancement of the 700MHz spectrum auction is unlikely to be welcomed over at the CSIRO, which is .

However, Optus has already jumped the gun, announcing in July that to deploy 3G mobile services at 972 sites across regional and remote Australia.

At the time, Optus products and delivery managing director, Andrew Buay, said the release of the regional spectrum, in advance of expected new spectrum allocations in the 700MHz and 2.5GHz bands in the coming years, would help the telco increase competition in the regional communications market.