(Telecompaper) Christian Paradis, Canada's Minister of Industry, has announced decisions to further promote competition in the Canadian mobile market, in an effort to give Canadians access to the latest technology at better prices. The Minister also announced that Telus' application to acquire Mobilicity's spectrum licences will not be approved. Mobilicity's licenses were among those set aside for new entrants in the 2008 AWS auction, which included restrictions on transferring licences to incumbents. In addition, the government outlined improvements to the policy on spectrum license transfers that will be released in the coming weeks, which followed consultations launched in March 2013. Going forward, proposed spectrum transfers that result in undue spectrum concentration, and therefore diminish competition, will not be permitted. This policy will apply to all commercial mobile spectrum licenses, including the 2008 AWS licenses. All applications for license transfers will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis and decisions will be issued publicly to increase transparency. In light of these decisions, the timing of the 700 MHz auction has been updated. The application deadline will now be 17 September 2013, and the auction will commence on 14 January 2014.