Street furniture is a term that is used by the telecom industry when talking about small cells deployed on public buildings, road lamps, traffic signals, and more. Street furniture’s basic role is to help with delivering better coverage to users. It is a boost to the existing major telecom infrastructure such as mobile towers.
Now, according to an ET Telecom report, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) is conducting a pilot project for deploying street furniture in several parts of the country. It is worth noting that with 5G, the need for mobile towers and sites would increase exponentially to ensure proper coverage can be delivered to the users when they are connected to mobile networks operating in very high spectrum frequencies.
TRAI Conducting Pilot Test at These Locations
TRAI is conducting its pilot test to see whether street furniture works well or not in four parts of the country. These include Kandla Port in Gujarat, Bhopal, Bengaluru Metro Rail Corporation, and the Indira Gandhi International (IGI) airport.
Kerala is already using street furniture to deliver better connectivity to the users. Many industry bodies such as the Cellular Operator’s Association of India (COAI) have voiced their opinion supporting the notion of using street furniture for 5G.
The commercial rollout of 5G will be a difficult process for the telcos to go through. For making it a success in India, the telecom operators must be provided with all the help to ensure a successful 5G rollout. This includes giving the telcos access to street furniture such as electricity poles, and more in an easier manner.
It is worth noting that the government had also allowed the telecom operators to start sharing their infrastructure for providing services. This would be a big boost to their business as the telcos won’t have to worry about spending in infrastructure for each region where their competitors are already present with a solid infra. It will also reduce the network rollout time for the operators.
