Mr. Sunil Mittal, Chairman, Bharti Airtel has released the letter he wrote to DoT regarding Spectrum controversy. I am glad he has challenged BSNL & MTNL over spectrum usage [Don’t know when will these companies improve]. He may get the international GSM lobby to back him 🙂
Mr. T.V.Ramchandran, Director, COAI said,
As per the current spectrum availability and the number of operator, Indian GSM operators have an average 7-8 MHz per operator, which is well below international average. But the operators have used their resources well. Considering the subscribers per MHz per sq km, India is miles ahead of its global counterparts.
In India you can find cell sites as close as 100 mts apart, which is a major challenge to the engineers to make it work efficiently without interference.
The government may relax the Telecom Engineering Centre’s recently finalized spectrum allocation criterion, the minimum subscriber limits that entitle mobile service operators to additional spectrum. They have formed a committee representing every section of the industry. The only sad part is the recommendations will be submitted to Minister of IT and don’t be surprised if he selectively choose the recommendations like he did earlier 🙂
Problems: Committee does not include incumbents in the race, thus all current players may form a lobby against auction. In the broader scenario it is time to re-write the National Telecom Policy as their are lot of technological advancements in the Wireless domain. The policy must encourage innovation and in the intermediate term, should encourage players like VaVasi Telegance.
Tags: Telecom, GSM, CDMA, Mobile Communications