Neelie Kroes, EU digital commissioner, says patchy 4G coverage in Europe can be traced back to countries trying to “over-squeeze” bidders in spectrum auctions and to regulators not being quick enough to release spectrum. This leads to LTE rollout delays, she says, which is damaging for the region’s economy.

The EU digital chief says three out of every four people living in the EU can’t access 4G/LTE mobile connections in their hometowns, while 4G rural access is practically unheard of. By comparison, in the US, over 90 per cent of people have 4G access.

“This is no way to run an economy,” complained Kroes in a statement. “It means also that Europeans living in rural areas and those on holiday get treated like second-class citizens. It doesn’t matter where you are, you pay money for a device and mobile subscription and it should work.”

One of the problems, she said, is that the spectrum prices companies pay can be 50 times higher in one EU country compared to another (which doesn’t make for a healthy market). On average, spectrum rights in the EU are almost four times more expensive than in the US.

And the result of high auction prices, insisted Kroes, is that companies cannot afford to stump up the €27 billion that the EU estimates is needed for network upgrades.

As far as Kroes is concerned, the consequences may well be dire. “The EU is teetering on the edge of network collapse,” she said. “Global mobile traffic is predicted to grow 66 per cent a year, smart devices are everywhere and people want to watch video on those devices. Without more spectrum being made available the whole thing falls apart.”

And the fault for the lack of spectrum, she said, lies squarely on national regulators. National level problems have caused procedural and licensing delays, argued Kroes, while auctioning processes have left mobile operators with little cash for roll-out networks once they have secured the right to do so. Combined with the fragmentation of 28 national markets, added the EU digital chief, and mobile operators have no real possibility to develop an EU-wide mobile strategy.

Kroes recently vented her frustration at certain EU member states for applying to delay the release of 800MHz spectrum (which is useful for rural coverage as signals travel further than higher-frequency bands).