- States at their level also need to make 5G a priority since this will be the infrastructure of the future
- India to have 88 Mn 5G connections by 2025, which is around 7 per cent of the country’s total telecom connections
India’s Minister of State for Communications, Sanjay Dhotre has reportedly said that there is a need for robust industry investment in 5G innovation, startups, and creation of 5G products that have the potential to create India-focused patents, reported Inc42.
Dhotre further stated that the government is doing its part to improve ease of doing business in the telecom sector and to ensure fair competition in the private sector. But the states at their level also need to make 5G a priority since this will be the infrastructure of the future.
GSMA’s prediction
Global System for Mobile Communications (GSMA), a trade body which represents the interests of mobile network operators worldwide, has predicted India to have 88 Mn 5G connections by 2025, which is around 7 per cent of the country’s total telecom connections.
“This will leave India trailing regional peers such as China, which is set to see almost 30 per cent of its total connections base on 5G by 2025, making it by some way the largest 5G market in the world,” GSMA intelligence report noted.
Telecom companies are awaiting the Indian government’s approval on spectrum allotment. Spectrum allocation in India is being done through auction process and the government is yet to auction the spectrum 3.3K – 3.6K MHz bands. The spectrum band (3.5 GHz spectrum) is expected to be the first band to be globally accepted for 5G deployment.
According to GSMA, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has given its recommendations on 5G spectrum prices, and Indian Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has planned spectrum auctions for the second half of 2019.
The GSMA report has noted that the telecom companies Bharti Airtel and Huawei have successfully conducted India’s first 5G network trial under a test setup at Airtel’s network experience centre in Manesar, Gurgaon.
Further, multiple telecom companies such as Vodafone, Samsung, Jio, and the government-owned BSNL, are said to be in talks for conducting 5G trials soon.
According to the National Digital Communications Policy 2018, India currently has approximately 1.5 Mn kilometres of optical fibre cable (OFC), and less than one-fourth of the towers are fibre-connected.
(News courtesy: Inc42)
