India’s 5G rollout is super impressive because of many reasons. 5G started rolling out in the country in the first week of October 2022 and Bharti Airtel is the first telco to launch 5G in India. Since then, the Indian telecom operators have covered close to 400 cities and towns in the country with their 5G networks. The speed at which 5G is being rolled out in India has also impressed the government. Indian telcos have surpassed the 5G rollout goals of the government by a huge margin.
The whole world is witnessing what India is doing with 5G. While India wasn’t the first to roll out 5G, it would definitely be the country to cover the entire geographical landscape with 5G faster than other nations. What has really helped the telcos is proper planning and then help from the government to set up infrastructure at a fast pace.
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The government has been actively simplifying the policies and reducing problems for the telcos and the IPs (infrastructure providers) in obtaining RoW (right of way) permissions from the state governments to lay fibre and set up infra to boost 5G.
Reliance Jio and Airtel have kept similar goals of covering India with 5G. Jio has targeted the end of 2023, while Airtel has targeted the end of March 2024 to bring its 5G to every part of India.
Industry executives across the global telecom market understand the power of India’s 5G. It is not just because of the speed at which the 5G is being rolled out. But it is also because of the speed at which the consumers are adopting 5G. The device ecosystem is already developing, and more affordable 5G smartphone options are coming to the Indian market every few months.
The 5G subscriptions in India are expected to reach 300 million by FY25, which is not far from here. That would mean that about a third of India’s mobile data-consuming population would be using 5G. Right now, the attention of the Indian telcos is on rolling out 5G everywhere. The network optimisation phase would come later on when the telcos would not only work to improve the 5G experience in general but would also extend the 5G coverage to highways, train journeys, and rural areas of India. However, this would be a long-term thing.
The fast rollout of 5G would not only be good for consumers or the telcos, but it would also benefit the entire economy. 5G is poised to create new job opportunities for the youth and enable use cases for businesses across industry verticals. For the first time, 5G would enable the kind of futuristic technologies that would improve the quality of life for an average person in India. Be it healthcare or entertainment, or education, 5G is promised to bring advancements in each of the areas.
