The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has recommended that Virtual Network Operators (VNOs) should partner with multiple telcos to improve services. Along with that, TRAI has also now recommended that VNOs should be allowed to take wireless services from one operator and wireline from another in one licensed service area (LSA). This gives more flexibility to the VNOs for offering higher-quality services.
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"The Authority is of the view that the implementation of these recommendations would give a boost to the quality of service of wireline access services in the country. It would also provide a flexibility to Access Service VNOs to obtain connectivity for wireless access service and wireline access service from different NSOs. This would enable Access Service VNOs to provide better service offerings to telecom consumers in the country," Trai said.
VNOs are not popular entities in India. Back in 2016, the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) introduced the regime of VNOs in India. VNOs are companies that lease the network capacity from the telcos and offer services to customers on top of that. VNOs are quite popular in countries such as the United States of America (USA).
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In India, the low-pricing model is one of the biggest barriers for VNOs to enter the consumer market. The VNOs can't compete with the private telcos in such a low-price environment. Thus the VNOs in India are focused towards acquiring enterprise customers. Also, in the consumer space, VNOs would only have a space at the regional level. It would be extremely hard and inefficient for a VNO to offer services to customers throughout India just like the telecom operators. It will be interesting to track the future of MVNOs in India as they are likely to stay in the B2B path.
