Starlink, a satellite communications service provider, has now received permission to operate in India. The company has reportedly been issued a global mobile personal communication by satellite (GMPCS) license. In the coming days, Starlink will get trial spectrum too. With this, India now has three companies that have the GMPCS license to offer satcom services to the customers - Starlink, Jio-SES, and Eutelsat OneWeb. Starlink still needs to get permission from the Indian National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre (IN-SPACe). According to an ET report, the company has already provided all the neccessary details from its end, but the nod from the authority is yet to come.
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Starlink had recently partnered with Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel for distributing its equipment directly to customers. The equipment cost and service cost is still unkown. The way things are progressing right now feels like Starlink will start offering services in India by the end of this year. This will be a start of new connectivity revolution in India. Starlink is already operational in more than 100 countries and is providing network in areas where fiber is hard to deploy.
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In India, this means that rural places can be easily connected with high-speed internet. The launch of commercial operations in India would require Starlink to extensively demonstrate how it is complying with the government's security conditions. The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has recommended that satellite spectrum shoud be given to the companies at just 4% of the adjusted gross revenue (AGR), which is to be assigned for five years. We will have to wait and see when Starlink services are finally commercially available. At this moment, no official word from the company has come.
