The proposal of the European Commission for a Regulation concerning the European single market for electronic communications contains ambitious pan-European targets. Among the most prominent are those set for wireless communications in terms efficiency, investments and innovation, while, at the same time, universal access, affordability and support to newcomers must be ensured. However, in their current form, auction and “beauty contest” procedures cannot fully contribute to meet the set objectives. A comparative SWOT analysis of both well-known authorisation algorithms is presented in this article.1 Based on this analysis, an optimized spectrum assignment algorithm is proposed, which brings together the strengths and opportunities and which eliminates threats and weaknesses of both popular algorithms.