I often find myself in awkward position when I come back to write something with Telecomblogs. Reason, there are many topics to write about but nothing specific, so should I talk about something particular today about? Yes indeed! So after a hiatus, something has promoted me to write about. Past two and half months were good enough overall (that’s right, I wrote last here in Nov), but again I don’t want to talk about statistics, which I don’t know much about.
My friend, Jayant has different opinion in what phase exactly Indian Telecom Industry. He wrote a beautiful and strong post today and after going through it, I thought something is missing here. So why not talk about it.
Since 2010, when last major spectrum auctions were held for 3G & BWA (LTE/WiMAX), we got almost all operators going forward with 3G rollout, albeit with slower pace. So now four years after award of spectrum (sufficient or insufficient???) are we still in project or rather deployment phase?
Not exactly! With reported growth in 3G Data usage (and corresponding revenues) and decline in revenues in voice segment (despite call rate hike & throwing per sec billing in dustbin), how it could be possible without backend infrastructure supporting 3G+ rates? A day before Vodafone’s new 3G data card, supporting HSPA rates (21 Mbps) is vivid example of industry’s forward move and belief that data is future, where operators are investing strongly into backend infra like devices, dongles & network infrastructure.
I do see lots of new commitments coming from different operators for investing into network infrastructures, spectrum auction & tapping new avenues of revenue either via services differentiation or product differentiation. Although these are not new things, post 3G auction era, lot has changed.
Take example of Bharti Airtel, the operator who manages most heterogeneous network at the moment, has subscribers on GSM (2G), 2.75G (EDGE), 3G, 3G+ (HSPA), LTE (4G) & Wi-Fi (802.11). Out of those six technologies, four have already reached the tipping point for Telco, except Wi-Fi & LTE, where we do see lots of traction this year.
Same goes with Vodafone, albeit not to that extent. The operator has joined late to on enterprise market, but with focus on MPLS & Wi-Fi, things are moving quite fast. I do see, LTE would be also on radar for them, but it would evolve slowly and operator would stick to HSPA (3G+) & Wi-Fi (Enterprise) to generate more revenues for this year at least.
Other strong player, namely Idea Cellular, is following leaders, but has demonstrated things well on execution side. Although, focus still lies with B2C segment, operator’s strong brand positioning in 3G & MNP market has helped it stay afloat and in many instances lead the pack also. I do see, Idea going strongly with 3G+ network rollout along with push to Wi-Fi and network upgrade to generate more cash.
RCom & Tata, going forward would look to revamp things as came to limelight in recent news, but going forward these two operators also have carved out niche to stay afloat in competition, where investment is going strong, specially into fiber, backhaul, 3G+ and 2G new rollouts.
Consolidation is inevitable, but that’s good sign and nothing to panic about. Some will miss the boat and others should move forward.
Telecom Operators can’t skip the route of investment more into new technologies all years. It’s simple. If you build, they will come and if they will come, you will get cash. If you don’t, nothing will happen.
There’s lots of conflict in minds of operator about LTE & Wi-Fi at moment. I would surely write about it in separate topic, but believe me, both can coexist and grow, complimenting each other and helping operators generate cash. LTE is long game but it should be here in a while. We all would be moving to 4G, and operators (and subscribers also) want that. Who wouldn’t want to surf YouTube on the go in car/metro/local/bus at reasonable cost?
Every technology passes through the cycle of initial challenges to maturity, where early adopters help things move fast to reach tipping point. Spectrum scarcity is always going to be there. Tackling that needs better technologies to optimize existing spectrum efficiently.
I do see there are lots of new opportunities coming up for operators & equipment vendors this year. While devices ecosystem is still in nascent stage for 4G/LTE, high speed Wi-Fi and HSPA (3G+) will push things in market. Backhaul pipes are going to be fatter and collaboration is on cards for more industry players. Network upgrade & more reach would help tele-presence grow.
In the end, we all know it’s not easy to bring returns on investment in short span, but more opportunities can be generated by becoming more innovative, little more aggressive and giving subscribers what they want in affordable way. Let’s not speculate much and focus on things that matter most!
