Sunil Bharti Mittal, Chairman of Bharti Enterprises, on Sunday said that the pricing of OneWeb's broadband-from-space services for retail customers would be the same as 4G prices. While for enterprises, he said that the pricing would depend on the basis of use cases. Along the lines of the launch of OneWeb's satellites by ISRO (Indian Space Research Organisation) at Sriharikota, Mittal said that spectrum for satellite communication couldn't be auctioned the way it was done for 5G, reports ET Telecom. For the unaware, Mittal is also the Chairman of OneWeb.
The internet services from OneWeb for retail customers as well as enterprise customers would start somewhere around the middle of 2023. As mentioned above, the pricing will stay the same as 4G for retail customers. But the big issue right now is acquiring spectrum for the satcom (satellite communications) companies.
The satcom companies are demanding the Indian government to avoid the auction route for providing spectrum for broadband-from-space services. As per a top industry executive, the auction of the spectrum would derail the investments that satcom companies have made in the Indian market.
Things are moving fast for the satcom companies, especially OneWeb. On Sunday, ISRO launched 36 of OneWeb's satellites into the LEO (low earth orbit) and will launch 36 more in January 2023. OneWeb would be paying the Indian Space agency somewhere around Rs 2,000 crore for the two launches, which include a total of 72 satellites. For the recent launch of 36 satellites, OneWeb has reportedly paid around Rs 1,000 crore to ISRO.
Other satcom companies are also planning their arrival in the Indian market. Jio is also planning to give competition to Bharti in the satcom services space. But we are still quite far away from actually commercially experiencing broadband-from-space services. OneWeb plans to launch services in India by mid-2023.
