Brazil mobile groups pay $1.3 billion in auction

Brazil’s major mobile phone carriers have paid a total of R$2.6bn ($1.3 billion) for spectrum for high-speed fourth-generation networks as Latin America’s biggest economy prepares for major sporting events in the next four years.

Aside from the major cellular operators -- which include Vivo, a unit of Spain’s Telefónica; Claro, controlled by Mexico’s America Movil; Tim, controlled by Telecom Italia; and Oi, part-owned by Portugal Telecom, investor George Soros’ Sunrise Telecomunicações -- also bought spectrum. With the upcoming soccer World Cup in 2014 and the Olympics two years later, Brazil next week will get a taste of the kind of pressure its creaking infrastructure will face, as Rio de Janeiro hosts 50,000 visitors for the Rio+20 international environmental summit, which promises to overwhelm its hotel infrastructure and create traffic chaos in parts of the city. Brazil’s telecommunications market is one of the world’s fastest growing as its growing middle class takes to the mobile Internet.