The much-awaited high speed 5G mobile services are likely to be rolled out in India in about a month’s time.
Addressing the inaugural event of International Telecommunication Union’s Regional Standardisation Forum (RSF) for Asia and Oceania region on Monday, Minister of State for Communications Devusinh Chauhan said, “In about a month, 5G mobile services will roll out in the country, which will have multiplier effects on the development of all sectors.”
Chauhan informed that a 6G Technology Innovations Group has also been set up. The group is working on developing an indigenous 6G stack. The government is promoting the indigenously designed, developed and manufactured advanced telecom technology, and as a result, India today has a strong home-grown 5G mobile communications ecosystem.
The minister said the process for the rollout of the 5G will be at an advanced stage by the end of this year. “By the end of this year, we are likely to see indigenously developed, and manufactured 5G stack, getting deployed, in rolling out 5G network in India. Our engineers have developed a set of 5G standards, which will facilitate the spread of the 5G network in rural areas,” Chauhan said.
Talking about the Union government’s initiatives to address the issues concerning digital divide, the Minister said the steps include taking optical fibers to all 6 lakh villages of the country, and also cover all these villages with 4G mobile communications.
Chauhan informed that around 1,75,000 villages are already provided with the optical fibre, while around 5,60,000 villages have 4G mobile facilities. A multi-billion-dollar, comprehensive plan has been made, which will ensure optical fibre and mobile communications in all six hundred thousand villages by 2025.
On the positive and forward-looking environment created by telecom reforms in the country, he said: “The recent 5G spectrum auction in India has fetched bids of 20 billion dollars. This very well reflects the confidence and sentiments of the Indian telecom industry.”
The recently held auction for the 5G spectrum reflects the confidence and sentiment of the Indian telecom industry in government policies, he added.
After 40 rounds and seven straight days of bidding, the highly-anticipated 5G spectrum auction concluded on August 1, fetching over Rs 1.50 trillion, higher than the government’s expectations. Leading telecom operators Reliance Jio Infocomm (Jio) and Bharti Airtel (Airtel) emerged the top bidders at the recently concluded spectrum auction.
Reliance Jio, Adani group, Bharti Airtel, and Vodafone Idea were the four major participants in the spectrum auction. Allocation of spectrums to the telecom operators is expected before August 15, and the initial 5G services in the country will start subsequently in several Indian cities.
5G is the fifth-generation mobile network capable of transmitting a large set of data at a very rapid speed. In comparison to 3G and 4G, 5G has a very low latency which will enhance user experiences in various sectors. Low latency describes the efficiency to process a very high volume of data messages with a minimal delay. 5G services are expected to be about 10 times faster than 4G.
The 5G rollout is also expected to bring more development in remote data monitoring in sectors such as mining, warehousing, telemedicine, and manufacturing, among others.