4G Rollout Unlikely Next Year

When 3G spectrum (and partial 4G) bidding ended last summer, there was both satisfaction over the conclusion of a long-drawn process and a positive anticipation of fast mobile connectivity for smartphone users. The telecom operators started the process of rolling out 3G mobile services after paying a combined $23 billion to the government for bandwidth to offer 3G telephone and broadband wireless Internet services. Now one year and a few months on, the deployment of 3G infrastructure across India can only be classified as dismal. Network availability is patchy and the promised 7-8 Mbps speeds for a seamless HD content display is still a mirage in the desert. This coupled with the high data charges serve as a deterrent for those who are willing to consume rich Internet apps such as Internet TV and live video streaming. Furthermore, the content available for consumption lacks both in direction and purpose. To check out the potential here, let's look at some facts. Smartphones in India on an average consume 200-250 MB/month on plain-vanilla GPRS packages (2.5G). A 3G enabled smartphone averages 400-500 MB/month and a 3G tablet comes to around 2.0 GB/month. Note that the large GSM operators have a 3G sub base of approx 2.0 — 3.0 mn each as only around 5-10% of the handsets are 3G enabled. Although, a promising trend here is that tablets, debuting in 2010, are witnessing data usage that is 5x that of a 3G smartphone.

The Indian telecom market size







India has the world's second-largest mobile phone users with over 865 million subscribers. It has the world's fourth-largest Internet users with over 100 million subscribers. The industry is expected to reach a size of Rs 344,921 crore (US$69.95 billion) by 2012 at a growth rate of over 26 per cent, and generate employment opportunities for about 10 million people during the same period.

Broadband to reach every village

Mobile broadband is a vital cog in government's plans to ramp up its mobile and Internet penetration in the country of 1.2 billion people to boost access to education and health services and propel economic growth. This would help in the growth of GDP and in promotion of socially beneficial facilities such as tele-education, tele-medicine, e-governance, as well as employment generation. In rural areas, connectivity at minimum speeds of 1 Mbps with ADSL 2+ technology (on wire) from about 20,000 existing exchanges in rural areas having optical fibre connectivity forms the backbone for these plans to succeed. Community service centres, secondary schools, banks, health centers, panchayats, police stations etc in the vicinity of telephone exchanges shall serve as the nodal point of contact for the common man.

Mobile broadband to facilitate rural mbanking

Next year should witness broadband on demand in every village. Another crucial sector to benefit through the mobile broadband surge is rural banking. Organized banking amongst rural masses is still not popular and part of the problem lies in the heavy infrastructure costs involved in setting up banks in remote areas. Reliable and fast mobile broadband services could help in setting up mobile branches in rural areas from where people can carry out banking transactions without too much hassles. Eko India's Simplibank, which uses mobile-based authentication to provide banking services, is a step in the right direction but needs infrastructure support to take banking services to the last mile across this country. It would be interesting to observe how the 3G story unfolds from here on.

More useful apps for 3G-based smartphones

Now, while the 3G deployment process was unbearably delayed (after initial planning started in 2003), India plans to move to advanced 4G mobile services by 2012, at par with the rest of the world. The 4G mobile broadband technology promises data transmission speeds that are 10 times faster than the prevailing 3G networks. Indian Govt auctioned for BWA (a precursor to 4G) spectrum and license in 2010, in which Reliance Infotel got one for pan-India coverage; the second block of 2.3GHz band was divided into Aircel, Airtel, Tikona, Qualcomm and Augere. State-run operators BSNL and MTNL were given BWA spectrum back in 2009 under 2.6 Ghz band which was non-standardized. The faster 4G wireless system is built to provide high data rates at about 100 Mbps so smartphone users can download music and high-definition video streams at optimal quality without any lag.

At a recent press conference the Union communications minister, Kapil Sibal, raised concerns about the content supplied by telecom players which he claimed benefited only the urban population rather than needs of the common man. "You can bring in a mobile device but if you don't have the content, there's no point in having a device. All stakeholders must come on board to develop content beyond entertainment," he said.

Don't expect 4G rollout to happen

There is a fear that introduction of 4G in India may be held back by lack of demand (unlike the 3G delay caused primarily by goverment's dilly-dallying policies), with consumers seeing little in terms of applications for the speedier telecom network. A key highlight of fourth-generation mobile services using Long-Term Evolution (LTE) technology (4G) is that customers are connected to a core network based on IP technology.

These access networks include fibre optics or coaxial cable networks connected to fixed locations or customers connected through Wi-Fi. The good part about the LTE technology is that it also supports the 3G (CDMA and GSM) networks. So, in case if your 4G connection is not activated then you can stay on the 3G network. As a result, in future, it would be impossible to identify whether the next generation network is a fixed or mobile network and the wireless access broadband would be used both for fixed and mobile services. Both fixed and mobile users will access services through a single core network.