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    It's time to adapt for Indian Telecom

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    It’s time to adapt for Indian Telecom

    An infrastructural pillar in the current scenario, Indian telecom has been through some turbulence in the past. Can we expect a brighter future for it?

    Pallavi.chakravorty@timesgroup.com

    According to a global EY research (EY Capital Confidence Barometer April 2020), telco leaders were not satisfied with their transformation road maps — 46 percent believed lack of long-term planning was holding back automation initiatives while 67 per cent saw lack of skills as a barrier to maximising AI. Today, four in five telco executives are either revaluating the speed of their automation initiatives or taking steps to adjust existing plans, the research says.

    In India too, the reality is no different. Indian telecom is evolving amidst a transition - from a real to a virtual world. A world powered by the Internet, and brought to us by telecom service providers. Such has been our dependence on the Web that from an average monthly wireless data consumption of 6,900 PB (petabytes) in the quarter ending December 2019, consumption increased to about 8,280 PB as on April 2020 (as per Cellular Operators Association of India). Clearly, telecom is one of the few sectors keeping the economic engines on.

    Clearly, the time is ripe to learn, evolve and adapt. With the rising pressure on networks, service providers are trying to adapt and cater to their customers’ specific needs. For example, Atria Convergence Technologies Ltd. experienced an increase of 40 per cent in their data traffic since March, according to the State of Internet Trends report. “The lockdown created an inherent need for new connections in cities such as Jaipur, Lucknow, Coimbatore and Vijayawada, among the others that we have presence in,” said it’s COO, Saurabh Mukherjee.

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    Adapting to a constantly evolving ecosystem would require India’s network operators to focus on network architectures that are intelligent, flexible and automated. But the sector that saw consolidation due to ARPU (average revenue per user) challenges, first needs stability in terms of AGR and ARPU issues before investing in advanced networks. “Once the ARPU levels stabilise, it will give the sector the much-needed cushion. Telcos should focus on cross-category movement by offering content services, OTT, and other value-added services,” believes Sanchit Vir Gogia, CEO, Greyhound Research.

    Airtel, which saw a growth of 0.9 percent over the previous quarter, is adapting as well. The telecom giant added 226 K DTH customers in the period and also added 10Tbps of additional capacity for key OTT players and internet giants. “We will become the first operator in India to deploy vRAN (open virtual radio access solution) based 4G network.

    As companies innovate to strengthen their network, the Adaptive Network introduced by Ciena, can perhaps enable them to transform their static network into a dynamic, programmable environment driven by analytics and intelligence. “We believe a network must grow smarter, more agile, and more responsive every day to match expectations,” said Rajesh Nambiar, Chairman and President, Ciena India.

    Telecom networks are clearly at the heart of our digital future. It is to be seen how this future is made bright with the right regulatory and policy support, and technological advancement.


    Disclaimer: Content Produced by Ciena



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