The telecom industry and tech players on Tuesday clashed over the recommendation of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) to allow enterprises to build their own private 5G networks for captive purposes. Opposing the move, the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) said this should not be allowed “for the financial viability and orderly growth of the telecom industry, which is more than capable of delivering these services to businesses.”
Quite in contrast, the Broadband India Forum (BIF), the industry body of tech players like Facebook, Google, etc, welcomed the recommendations to allow private networks. “In terms of private networks, Trai’s comprehensive recommendations are balanced and practical and address the interests of the telcos, the enterprises, as well as the public – since more private networks would lead to more employment opportunities and business, and in turn, translate into greater economic output and benefits,” BIF said in a statement.
In its recommendations released on Monday, Trai has said that non-telecom enterprises would be allocated a 5G spectrum for building their private networks. As per options given by the regulator, a private network can be rolled out through a slice of the telco’s network, or an enterprise may request a telco to establish an independent isolated private network in its premises using the spectrum of the telecom operator, or an enterprise may obtain the spectrum on lease from a telco and establish its isolated captive network.
The regulator has also suggested that an enterprise may obtain the spectrum directly from the government and establish its captive network. This recommendation has not gone down well with the telecom operators as they fear that it may open the doors for administrative allocation of spectrum to enterprises.
According to COAI, by allowing private captive networks for enterprises, Trai is dramatically altering the sector dynamics and hurting the financial health of the industry rather than improving it.
“Enterprise services constitute 30-40% of the industry’s overall revenues. Private networks once again disincentivise the telecom industry to invest in networks and continue paying high levies and taxes,” COAI said.
Under private networks, corporates can set up their WiFi, data network instead of taking the services from any telecom service provider as is the norm today. The concept of the private network is emerging as one of the most promising use cases of 5G. A white paper by Qualcomm had made a case for allowing such networks citing three major reasons. First, such networks guarantee coverage in remote locations where commercial network coverage is limited. Second, they lead to more network control, like applying configurations that are not supported in a public network and enterprises can retain sensitive operational data at premises. And third, private 5G networks would be able to meet better performance profiles.
Trai has said that the captive wireless private network should not be connected to a public network in any manner. For spectrum, the regulator has suggested that the department of telecommunications (DoT) may consider the possibility of earmarking some spectrum (at least 40 MHz) in the 3700-3800 MHz frequency range for low power indoor use for a private captive network. DoT may also consider identifying the frequency range 4800-4990 MHz for IMT purposes and consider the possibility of carving out some spectrum (at least 40 MHz) in this frequency range to earmark for the private captive network.
DoT may also consider identifying some spectrum (at least 400 MHz) in the frequency range 28.5-29.5 GHz to earmark for private captive networks, which can co-exist with satellite earth stations.