Though Indian telecom sector is having a lackluster show for last few years, but some zeal hopefully returning to the tel-tech sector in next 12-18 months. More excitement comes with government's new plans with telecom including 100% FDI in telecom and relief packages for telecom service providers.
Broadband Scene to be Changed: Wired vs Wireless (4G/5G) vs Satellite Internet, Airtel's OneWeb vs Jio 5G, OneWeb vs Starlink
Though India's broadband scenario is not comparable with global counterpart, the scene can see lots of improvement. Wired vs Wireless debate is going to over soon, as satnet is coming to India at affordable (not cheap) price.
There are several satnet projects are aiming to go global, like:
- Tesla famed Elon Musk backed SpaceX's Starlink
- Bharti Airtel backed OneWeb
- Amazon backed Project Kuipers
- British start up Methera Global Communications
- HughesNet
- Iridium
- Eutelsat
- Viasat
- O3b Networks
Bharti Airtel has infused 361 million euros in OneWeb in July 2021, taking it's stake to 39%. Other investors in OneWeb are French Eutelsat, Japan's Softbank & UK Government - each holds 19.3% stake. UK Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng shares his excitement as he sees 'strong future for this incredible, cutting-edge company and a robust commercial case for investment.'
OneWeb has launched 36 new satellites in May 2021 and the company is working in a war-footing manner to go commercial in mid 2022. In India they have even obtained a licence of 20 years of satcom operations from DoT.
The major boost in the satnet business came after Elon Musk entered into it with Starlink. The satnet ambitions have been propelled by reduced cost to launch a satellite at space (ISRO showed the path). Also cost of building a satellite has been cheaper than ever now, as the companies are building a constellation with several numbers of satellites (Starlink will have 3,000 satellites & Oneweb has plans of 648 satellites initially) - that helps to cut the time and price to build a satellite.
Early data from Ookla shows Starlink offers quite impressive speed - around 80Mbps (promised speed upto 300Mbps) with their LEO satellites. That's too good compared to average speed of India's 4G or fiber broadband.
Globally telecom majors are already aware of 'the threat from space', though Tesla & SpaceX Starlink owner Elon Musk does not see Starlink as direct competitor to traditional telecom services.
Vodafone & Japanese digicom major Rakuten have been investing in ASG & Science, a company to make a tech solutions that would enable smartphones to connect to LEO satellites.
India's satellite space will be very interesting as it might get launched before 5G comes to India. But it is expected that OneWeb or Starlink would not try to disrupt the market.
Present update:
Oneweb signed a LoI with NewSpace India Ltd, commercial arm of ISRO to use PSLV & GSLV-MkIII platforms to launch satellites from 2022.
09/21: Oneweb has started building gateways required for interface between the internet & satellite network.
09/21: Canada based Telesat has plans to go commercial LEO satnet in 2024. For India specific goal they had very formal talks with Vi, Jio & Hughes.
In early December '21, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) sent a note to Starlink that the company is yet to obtain a license for satellite internet and hence it should not solicit any telecom business or collect any fees for its upcoming satellite broadband. TRAI also asked the company not to accept pre-bookings (which costs fully refundable $99 - approx Rs 7500) and the Starlink stopped taking pre-orders from India.
Sanjay Bhargava, Director of Starlink’s India subsidiary, Starlink Satellite Communications hinted that the company will apply for a local license before January 31, 2022 and will roll out services within December 2022.
While government keeps Starlink awaiting for Indian business, Starlink wants to subsidize its services for Indians by getting support from government's USOF (universal service obligation fund). In a linkedIn post Mr. Bhargava indicated that the service, though focused to offer rural internet connectivity, is estimated to cost around Rs 1.6 Lakh per terminal in the first year, and Rs 1.15L from the 2nd year onwards.
5G vs 5Gi : Airtel vs Jio
As Jio has some experience in creating its own ecosystem on 4G, Jio wants to go with desi 5G or 5Gi (5G of India) standard based on Open RAN technology.
Mr Mittal, of Bharti Airtel who saved the company from the wrath of Jio since 2017, is not convinced with 5Gi. He knows the limitations of the country as R&D here is pretty poor and for this reason, he insists on go global. His idea would cut down cost on R&D as well as for procuring equipments from global vendors as the order would be huge enough.
However, Rajen Vagadia, VP and President Qualcomm India & SAARC, believes that India's 5G standard suits country's geopolitical situation as Open RAN could cut down dependency on Chinese gear makers. With Open RAN operators can use any software system on any hardware system. Flexibility of Open RAN would the main price point breaker for the cash strapped Indian operators. At the same time he also thinks that with 5Gi, Indian equipment makers like STL and HFCL can be a global supplier of this 5Gi tech, and Qualcomm would love to be their global partner. And for that standardization of 5Gi is very much essential.
Mainstream 5G in India: ETA Delayed
Whenever 5G comes to India, it will be very limited to high demand pockets of metro cities only even after 3-4 years of commercial launch. Even in US the four telecom majors are following the same strategy. Unlike 4G was launched at the price of 3G by Airtel in 2012, 5G will be a premium service by telcos and you might have to shell out extra - same applies for Jio subscribers also.
The main 2 things which is halting India's 5G dream are price and spectrum. Without a proactive mindset from the government these issues will not be solved.
And with milimeter wave band, service providers will have to deploy densest network - it will take more time than the companies are thinking.
Writing down in January, 2024, 5G auction happened in July 2022 and 5G was launched by October 2022. Not only that 5G deployment in India is seemed to the fastest of the world.
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