Technical Insight

5G, The world of Possibilities

SANJAY KUMAR
Skill Lync

Gearing up
new capabilities users can expect and what a 6,228 MHz spectrum at a price of
We just concluded the 5G Spectrum business opportunities it is going to bring 18799 Cr INR
Auction in India and 5G rollouts in India to the companies.  Adani Group has acquired 400
are around the corner. So, we may get some MHz spectrum at a price of 212 Cr INR
natural questions on what 5G brings to the Spectrum Auction However, Jio was the only company
table and how it is different from previous This was one of the biggest spectrum that acquired a 700 MHz band spectrum
generations, what new use cases it enables, auctions and the total bid amount 1.5 Lac in all 22 circles. This is considered a very
and how retail customers, Enterprise Crores INR. The total spectrum on offer important decision as 700 MHz can give
customers, and Mobile Network Operators was 72 GHz and 71% i.e. 51.2 GHz was much higher coverage compared to other
are going to get benefitted out it. sold. The three major bidders were leading bands which were available for buying.
5G is not new to the world and has been private MNOs of India i.e. Reliance Jio, This is one step that can help Jio to acquire
available in some countries for a while and Bharti Airtel, and Vodafone Idea. 2G customers of Airtel and Vodafone.
learnings from those networks are going to Adani Group was a surprise entry, but it bid
help India deploy better networks. only for a very small chunk of spectrum for Way forward
A lot of new telecoms, IT/ITES, and Private Network use only. The below data By looking at the outcomes of the spectrum
Startup companies are entering into this suggests the major spectrum buys for all auction, Jio looks like a clear winner
space and this 5G space is buzzing with a these players. followed by Airtel. However, it may not
lot of excitement.  Jio has acquired a 24,740 MHz be easy as it looks. Vodafone Idea is still
In this article, we will try to understand spectrum at a price of 88078 Cr INR struggling with cash flows and may take
what the current status of 5G Rollouts in  Airtel has acquired a 19,868 MHz some time to become relevant in this game.
India is, what makes 5G so exciting, what spectrum at a price of 43084 Cr INR Adani group has still not opened all its cards
new use cases it is going to enable, what  Vodafone Idea Limited has acquired and we should be ready for some more

October 2022 | Telematics Wire | 35

surprises coming from Adani Group. for wireless mobile communication technology discussions and more and
Both Jio and Airtel are rushing for from low bands to mid bands to higher more companies setting up their base and
early rollouts and new announcements are bands. The radio spectrum is a precious building their engineering teams in India,
made every week. Both are getting into a resource and 5G is trying to make use of is going to change how India contributes to
lot of strategic partnerships to build the these spectrums in the best way possible. the world of Telecom. Some new initiatives
ecosystem around 5G, be it Jio Partnering Licensed spectrum is a precious resource, like Production Linked Incentive
with Google for budget phones or Airtel so more and more efforts are being done Scheme (PLI) for Large Scale Electronics
partnering with IBM and Red Hat for for building new capabilities around Manufacturing and the Semiconductor
building secure Clouds. unlicensed bands as well as higher bands manufacturing push are some of the things
Undoubtedly, 5G offers multiple called millimeter waves. which are going to give India a bigger
times higher speeds and lower latencies We may wonder what the benefits of 5G opportunity.
compared to 4G and it has started enabling could be unless we have new applications
some interesting use-cases globally that are that will need these higher speeds and Need for Speed
changing the lives of millions of people and lower latencies that 5G has to offer. As we India is already the highest data-consuming
building new revenue streams for Mobile are unlocking the possibilities of 5G, let’s country in the world, and it is going to grow
Network operators. understand why 5G is a promising thing further. Content consumption is increasing
It comes with a lot of features like for India Inc. - day by day and more and more vernacular
Software controlled networks, Logical content is fueling its growth. The average
sectioning of networks referred to as More opportunities for Mobile monthly data consumed per user In
Network Slicing, and distributed cloud Indian IT Companies India is 17 GB, which grew 50% In the last
infrastructure referred to as Multi-Access India was already a superpower in the 5 years, and it is expected to touch 40-50
Edge computing (MEC). Software industry for a decade, accounting GB per month by 2025. This growth mainly
In addition to these, we have new for more software exports than oil imports. comes from more video consumption
promises of Private networks, Open and However, when it comes to Telecom and the popularity of social media on the
Secure Networks, Network Exposure for technologies, we were one of the last go. Even the video quality is changing
third-party access, and interworking with few countries to adopt new technologies from Standard Definition (SD) to High
most of the other technologies like 4G, because of price-sensitive markets. In Definition (HD) and beyond. India has a
WiFi, Wireline, etc. However, there is fact, we never contributed much to the massive rural and semi-urban population
limited backward compatibility with 2G global telecom standards landscape except which was untouched in the previous
and 3G networks to help Mobile Network by contributing in the background and generation (2G/3G) networks that got
Operators to scrap those networks building some Network Operations Centers connected to the internet with 4G and is
gradually. for managing global networks. expected to grow further with 5G.
One of the important aspects of 5G However, with the software-centric Recent growth in EdTech because of
technology is to introduce several new networks and Cloud play, India is covid has given further growth to Mobile
bands of frequency spectrum suitable becoming the epicenter of Telecom Networks Operators. For example, the
current K-12 school system in India
is one of the largest in the world with
more than 1.4 million schools with 250+
million students enrolled who are now
getting connected to the world of the
internet.

Let’s Play
Mobile gaming or Online gaming getting
very popular in India and more people
are using these kinds of applications.
Augmented Reality, Virtual reality is giving
an immersive experience to these users
while using these gaming applications.
As per the report of KPMG, India is
expected to become one of the world’s
leading markets in the gaming industry.
Growing steadily for the last five years, it is
expected to treble in value and reach $3.9
billion by 2025. The total number of online
gamers grew 8% from 360 million in 2020
to 390 million in 2021.

36 | Telematics Wire | October 2022

OTT (Over-The-Top) licenses for deploying Private or Captive cities and factories are imagined where
applications dominate Networks and we may see a lot of Private devices, machines, and robots work in a
all other modes of networks being built in India as well. closely connected environment and operate
communications autonomously.
Telecom networks are transforming Industry 4.0 Smart factories will have the ability to
into service networks compared to just Networks till 4G were mainly targeted manage production and allow companies
providing connectivity to users. For towards the end user for providing to optimize the resources used and
example, Jio has a big bouquet of services Broadband data rates to them. However, improve the quality of products.
which includes Instant messaging, Video, that remains one of the focus areas by
Movies, Books, News, Music, and what not. providing much higher network peak data Summary
Airtel is also working in a similar direction rates of 20 Gbps in 5G compared to 1 Gbps In this article, we have looked at the big
either with some in-house expertise or in 4G Networks, there is a lot of work is picture of the possibilities which are
some strategic partnerships. They are also done on connecting devices, industries, and unlocked by 5G without getting too many
collaborating with companies like Netflix, enterprises. With the introduction of some technical details. We may see full fledge
Prime Video, etc to give a better experience new service verticals in 5G like mMTC 5G networks in India and Reliance Jio
to their users. Many of these services are (Massive Machine Type Communication) and Bharti Airtel will be front ending this.
bundled with their prepaid or postpaid which connected millions of devices, These networks are going to be massive
plans. uRLLC (Ultra-reliable Low Latency networks in the world and will set up some
Communication) which gives very reliable examples of how to build networks of this
5G Private Networks and fast networks, and V2X (Vehicle to scale.
With a lot of these new requirements from Everything) to connect millions of vehicles, At the same time, 5G brings a lot of new
new use cases of 5G networks, achieving 5G takes a leap on the services offered by opportunities to Users, Enterprises, and
diverse performance requirements may not 4G Networks. Specifically, mMTC and Mobile Network Operators.
be possible in public networks. So, there uRLLC are going to change the way how Exciting times ahead!!
is a lot of traction for deploying many of
these use cases in private networks referred
to as Private 5G or NPN (Non-Public AUTHOR
Networks). These private networks can SANJAY KUMAR
be completely isolated from public 5G Director - Telecom
Networks and can be integrated with Public Skill Lync
Networks. Even Networks Slices can be Sanjay Kumar is a Senior Telecom & Cloud (AWS) Training
Professional with 20+ years of experience in Telecom/Cloud
used as a private network in some scenarios. Training, Operations & Maintenance, Projects, and Training
China has already deployed more than 5000 Content Development, Telecom R&D and testing etc. He is also an
private networks. AWS Certified Solution Architect - Associate and AWS Authorized
Instructor (AAI).
5G auction in India has already given

October 2022 | Telematics Wire | 37