Government said that Elon Musk-owned Starlink would provide only 20 lakh satcom (satellite communications) connections in India, clearing the air on threats to domestic players like Bharti-led OneWeb and Reliance Jio led SES.
“Starlink can have only 20-lakh customers in India and offer up to 200 mbps speed. That won’t affect telecom services,” Pemmasani Chandra Sekhar, Minister of State for Telecommunications told reporters here on the sidelines of Bharat Sanchar Nigam (BSNL) review meeting.
Pemmasani said there won’t be any threat to the terrestrial telecom services including that of State-owned BSNL.
He also said that the upfront cost for satcom services will be too high and monthly cost may be around ₹3,000.
Satcom services are expected to target rural and remote area where BSNL is known to have significant presence.
Meanwhile, Pemmasani said that BSNL’s 4G roll out is complete and it does not plan to increase tariff as of now.
“We want market first. There are no tariff hikes planned,” he added.
According to sources, the satcom services can be kicked off in India once the spectrum is provided administratively, to the three companies, which could take only a few months now.
“The allocation (of spectrum) is expected in the next three months. After that it is up to the companies when they want to start rolling out the services,”.
As part of the review, several new initiatives recently launched by BSNL were highlighted, aimed at enhancing service offerings and customer value, BSNL said in a statement. The initiatives include 4G expansion and rollout in multiple telecom circles; introduction of IFTV for FTTH and BiTV for mobile customers platforms for next-generation infotainment; BSNL National Wi-Fi Roaming (nationwide Wi-Fi roaming service for customers); tailored BSNL VPN services and bundled packages for enterprise and government clients; and a Spam-Free Network — a first-of-its-kind solution to eliminate scam and spam communications in real time, the company added. The Hindu BusinessLine