5G launch in sight: Telcos issued spectrum task letters

In what might considerably cut back timelines of community deployment by telecom operators, the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has issued the spectrum task letters to telcos simply 17 days after the auctions for 5G spectrum was concluded. Comparatively, within the earlier auctions final yr, these letters have been issued greater than a month after bidding ended.

Communications Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw tweeted on Thursday morning, “5G update: Spectrum assignment letter issued. Requesting TSPs (telecom service providers) to prepare for 5G launch.”

Bharti Airtel stated it was supplied with an allocation letter for the designated frequency bands it bought at this yr’s 5G spectrum auctions “hours after” it submitted its first tranche of upfront dues in the direction of the airwaves to the DoT, stated Bharti Enterprises founder & chairman Sunil Bharti Mittal. Calling it an instance of ease of doing enterprise, he stated this has by no means occurred on this three decade lengthy expertise with the DoT.

“No fuss, no follow up, no running around the corridors and no tall claims. This is ease of doing business at work in its full glory. In my over 30 years of first-hand experience with the DoT, this is a first. Business as it should be…” Mittal stated in a press release.

On Wednesday, the DoT obtained Rs 17,876 crore as upfront dues from 4 entities that purchased spectrum within the auctions that ended earlier this month. Bharti Airtel paid the best quantity of Rs 8,312.4 crore, adopted by Rs 7,864.7 crore from Reliance Jio, Rs 1,679.98 crore from Vodafone Idea and Rs 18.94 crore from Adani Group arm Adani Data Networks.

As per DoT’s guidelines for receiving funds from the spectrum auctions, corporations have the choice to pay dues in 20 equated annual instalments.

However, they’re additionally free to pay your complete quantity or a part of it upfront, with the minimal period for upfront cost being two years.

On August 5, the Department had issued demand notices to all of the 4 corporations to pay up their spectrum funds in 10 days, with Wednesday being the ultimate day.

Analysts monitoring the sphere stated that earlier than this yr, spectrum task was sometimes a months’ lengthy course of. For occasion, in final yr’s auctions, which ended on March 2, telecom operators had submitted their first upfront dues by March 18. But the spectrum task occurred on April 16, virtually a month later after the funds have been made. In 2021, the quantity of spectrum offered was price Rs 77,814.80 crore, virtually half of what was offered this yr.

“Allocation of spectrum post auctions is an administrative and bureaucratic task, and it shows that the government was well prepared in this year’s auctions. Even the earlier decisions that have been taken regarding this, including issuing the Notice Inviting Applications (NIA) for the auctions that was released right after the Cabinet cleared the country’s biggest ever spectrum auctions so far, shows that everything was already in place. It points towards the government making a conscious effort to cut bureaucratic slack. Sunil Mittal is right to highlight this change,” telecom analyst Mahesh Uppal stated.

Bharti’s Mittal stated that the federal government additionally has assigned the corporate E-band spectrum “as promised”. The E-band spectrum, which is radio waves within the 70-80 GHz band, are pegged to play a significant position in serving to the telcos with backhaul, which is able to assist smoothen knowledge on their community. Last month, the DoT had agreed to provisionally allot E-band airwaves solely to cell operators through the executive route in circles the place they maintain 5G spectrum.

Newsletter | Click to get the day’s greatest explainers in your inbox

Airtel and Jio have unveiled their 5G rollout plans, with the previous saying that it’s going to begin rolling out the service this month itself and, by 2024, is anticipating to cowl giant components of the nation, together with in rural areas. Airtel has additionally ready detailed community roll-out plans for five,000 cities in India. Jio, in the meantime, has accomplished 5G protection planning in 1,000 cities.

India’s greatest ever spectrum public sale for 5G airwaves had ended on August 1 with bids upwards of Rs 1.5 lakh crore coming in after seven days of bidding unfold over 40 rounds, belying preliminary expectations that the public sale course of can be wrapped up in below three days.

Jio emerged as the most important spender within the 5G spectrum public sale, buying virtually half of all of the airwaves offered for greater than Rs 88,000 crore, and was additionally the one one to have acquired spectrum within the premium 700 MHz band. Airtel, shelled out Rs 43,084 crore to accumulate a complete of 19.8 GHz of spectrum within the 900 MHz, 1,800 MHz, 2,100 MHz, 3,300 MHz and 26 GHz bands. Vi spent Rs 18,799 crore and bid for sure medium and excessive frequency bands. Adani Data Networks acquired spectrum solely within the 26 GHz band and spent Rs 212 crore.