India is expected to witness the rollout of fourth generation (4G) mobile telephone services by the next year. Telecom equipment vendors and service operators at present are screening the 4G equipments and technology for its final launch in the country. 4G would provide broadband capacity of upto 100 MB which is far superior to that of 3G (2 MB).
Chandra Prakash, Telecom Commission member and ex union secretary official informed Business Standard, “The 4G equipment and technology is on trail as service providers hold BWA (broadband wireless access) licenses.“
According to him, under license terms, the spectrum would be withdrawn if BWA license holders fail to cover 50 per cent of the rural area by 2015.
“The 4G is likely to be in India sooner than later, as early as next year, because it is economically more advantageous than 3G, apart as it can be easily upgraded on the existing infrastructure,” said JDSU India (an optical products and solutions provider)official, Nikhil Sadarangani.
Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) in a consultation paper on 4G for high-speed wireless services said that while 3G was being spread in India, various developed economies were concentrating on deploying even more advanced network to meet the growing need of data, content and speed.
Major points in the consultation paper include suitable spectrum band, block size of spectrum that is to be auctioned, maximum spectrum allowed to a bidder, criteria for bidding, rollout rules, charges of the usage of the spectrum, quality of the service and security issues.
Prakash also informed that the telecom sector would not shift to wireless systems completely. The networks that connect subscribers shall be wireless like present and be improved but the core telecom network, that is the transmission media would be running on optical fibre cables (OFC).
The Centre is pondering over the National Telecom Policy, 2011 that proposes various revolutionary alterations in the telecom industry.
In a National Seminar organized by the Institution of Electronics & Telecommunication Engineers on ‘Wireless Vision: A Global Perspective & Issues’, Prakash said that under service obligations, 150 million broadband connections is the target for the next three years from todays 30 million.
The government has the aim to spread 500,000 km of OFC to connect 250,000 panchayats in the country.