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The key players of the industry came together on a single platform to discuss the issues pertaining to the 3G Technology

Mumbai hosted Voice&Data CEO Conclave 2005. The key players of the industry came together on a single platform. Availability and allocation of spectrum for existing service providers, licensing policy, and broadening the customer base by targeting rural areas were salient issues that were discussed. Issues such as availability of content for mobile and the scope in content development were also raised. The need for availability of technology to support 3G services was also highlighted in the panel discussions.

Delivering the keynote address at the Mumbai edition of the CEO Conclave, Kuldeep Goyal, CGM, BSNL Maharashtra, said that the new telecom policy that is expected soon, has to address various issues related to 3G. He said that the policy would focus on the issue of licensing in terms of whether new licenses should be issued for 3G or should the existing operators be allowed to offer 3G services. Goyal wondered if there was space for more operators, given the fact that each circle or state already has at least six operators.

According to Goyal, another key issue is the licensing fee. “Some people say that there should not be any license fee. Others point that Rs 15,000 crore or so, can be raised by selling 3G licenses,” he said. The other important issue is spectrum, said Goyal. He was optimistic that the question of spectrum would be sorted out before operators roll out services. He said interconnect related issues also need to be addressed in the new telecom policy.

Goyal emphasized that 3G infrastructure must be adequate to support the requirements of a better quality of service. “Another important issue is the coverage, which will have to be addressed. If we have to achieve the target of 250 mn phones by 2007, we have to make sure that we take it to the rural masses. And for that coverage has to improve,” said Goyal.

Keynote: Kuldeep Goyal, CGM, BSNL Maharashtra

Pointing out that entertainment content would be the key driver of 3G data services, Goyal hoped that new content creation would get a boost once 3G services are rolled out. According to Goyal, cost of 3G devices will have to come down and local language interfaces will have to be built for 3G to really happen.

Goyal said that both UMTS as well as CDMA1X EVDO would be there because the operators on GSM and CDMA would be migrating to these new platforms. He also added that India could even directly start on HSDPA, the fourth generation mobile technology. “A right mix of all these things-content, devices, access technology, and of course the regulatory policies-will give a big boost to 3G,” said Goyal.

Session 1: Regulatory Impediments for 3G

Participating in the panel discussion on regulatory challenges for 3G, Madhav Joshi, CLO, Tata Teleservices, pointed out that all licenses in India are technology neutral. So, operators don't really require any new license to launch 3G services. However, what operators need is spectrum, he said. “We are starved of spectrum for even our voice telephony. So, if I had the spectrum, I could launch my EVDO immediately,” he added. He further said in this background, the statement from the government is that a possibility of some new operators and licensing for 3G is a bit strange.

Joshi was of the view that the recommendations made by regulator with regard to spectrum allocation is unreasonable because it was talking about the IMT2000 spectrum. In that spectrum the CDMA handsets are not available, he said. Given this, he wondered if the government wanted a situation where only the GSM operators can start the 3G services and the CDMA operators would be looking at the sky? Joshi recommended that government should give operators some space in the existing channel either in 800 or 1900 band. “As soon as we get the spectrum, we can offer all the 3G applications and launch EVDO. We don't need any technology changes,” he said.

Sanjay Sethi, GM, Wireless Services, MTNL, Mumbai, observed that the non-resolution of the spectrum issue was making operators impatient.  “It needs to be resolved fast. We are not happy with the present situation,” Sethi said, pointing out that all operators have planned their core network for evolution to 3G, but the radio portion is held up due to non-allocation of spectrum. Sethi hoped that the government could take a pragmatic view in spectrum allocation considering certain key issues. “The government should not go for adhoc allocation, but take a long term view,” he said.

Besides, he said that the economy of the scale of equipment available should be factored, while allocating spectrum. Sethi also emphasized on the need to keep out non-serious players, check hoarding of spectrum, and that allocation should be need-based. Sethi said government has learnt a lot from international experiences so, it is unlikely that it will come out with a policy having a negative impact. He hoped that the new telecom policy would boost 3G.

Session 2: Global Success Stories

Participating in the session on global success stories that focused on learnings from international experiences, Dr Ishwar Pittampalli, CTO, Lucent, said that it's the market force that will decide what's going to be the most efficient way of using the spectrum. “Most of the time regulators are government bodies and they cannot predict what's going to happen down the road. Moreover, they cannot keep up with the pace at which the technology is evolving. So, I think they should know how to use spectrum through the market force. That's one lesson that I have learned from speaking to operators and regulators across the globe,” he said. He also said that allocation of spectrum should be on equal basis. This means it should be technology neutral. It should be left to the operators to decide how they want to use a particular band. And the regulators should not dictate what service or application should be offered in a particular band, said Pittampalli.

Talking about lessons that India can learn is not just about voice, but much more. Dr G Venkatesh, CTO, Sasken Communications, said that basically number of challenges from the perspective of end-to-end testing ensuring that services are stabilized before they are deployed. “The cycle of planning, stabilizing, testing, and deploying becomes more complex as we go to 3G. The integration challenges are very hard because you are bringing in IT related technologies, bringing in security related things, bringing in video etc. on one platform and then try to deliver it. All that makes 3G much more complex,” he said. However, many of these trials and tribulations have been taken care of and many of the technologies have stabilized before coming to India, which is good for India.

For Mehul Desai, CEO, C-Sam, 3G is really about applications. “People seem too inclined to pay for 'say something about myself' kind of applications,” he remarked, adding that it could mean paying a bill on your phone or sending money cross border, it could mean anything, but common theme would be secure personalized applications. He also pointed out as much as it is about applications, the need of the applications from market to market was very different. “You need to go beyond voice and data, by data I mean content and broadcast data, it needs to be more about personalized transaction and personalized applications, then whatever is provided needs to cover the entire spectrum because there are opportunities and adoption could come from anywhere,” he added.

Delphine Reffet, HP, emphasized the need to work closely with local application and software developers. She called upon Indian operators to exploit the vast pool of Indian developers for developing applications that can make 3G successful. She also said that the infrastructure that is deployed should be scaleable and standard compliant. “Interoperability and manageability of applications is a must for any infrastructure that is deployed,” she added.

Referring to a survey of operators by E&Y, which found many operators admitting that they were grappling with 3G implementation and they are still far away from success, Shailin Desai, Manager, E&Y, as of now there is no one magic formula for 3G success, but the operators are doing very innovative things. “For instance, in Australia, Telstra and 3 have got together and to set up the entire network. Telstra and 3 would use the same network. This is an innovative move to save on the set up cost of a 3G network,” he said.

John J Sheen, MD, ABSI, observed that if one looks at how people are approaching convergence, you have to really learn from how the Koreans have decided to roll our their networks. He said that when the operators believed the vendors and believed it as a bible, they paid too much and when they decided to look at the functionality of the respective networks and how to apply the technology in their deployments, they started making from that. “It is really about application, it's all about content,” he emphasized. Referring again to Korea, he said that working on standard technologies is much better than believing a vendor.

Session 3: 3G Strategies for Indian Service Providers

Talking about 3G strategies for Indian service providers, Anil Tandan, VP, Networks, Idea Cellular, observed that as far as capex is concerned for existing operators there is a distinct advantage. They can use their existing infrastructure and not put exclusively new sites just for 3G network.  He said that at times, the question that arises is, what about those who have a 900 MHz network and are now going for a network, which is 1800 MHz? How do you handle that? “Typically what has happened is that all the networks in the area where you are going for 3G network is going to be a capacity limited so therefore it is not a coverage issue. So, the existing sites would suffice for putting up the 1800 or 1900 0r 2100 3G network,” he added. He also said that operators cannot have a pure 3G, but a 2G and 3g co-existing.

Ajay Madan, CEO, Essar Spacetel, was of the view that with more competition in the 3G handset space it's quite certain that prices of 3G handsets would be definitely go down to the level where they can be affordable to the Indians. He was hopeful that very soon there would be a 60 dollar 3G handset in the market. “Let's take a case in point where a new operator comes in who wants to role out a completely new 3G network alone. What should be the business case for it? What would be the bottlenecks for these operators” Madan wondered. He was of the view that for a new operator the capex on the infrastructure would be the same as for a 2G operator.   He also said that out-roaming would not be an issue, but in-roaming could be a problem.

Talking about the 3G infrastructure, Prakash Ranjalkar, COO, GTL Infrastructure, emphasized that if 3G has to reach and benefit the masses covering India as a whole would become critical. He noted that there is a case for innovation and India is always at the forefront of innovation for bringing down cost of delivery.

Sandeep Gupte, principle technology officer, Bharti Cellular, Mumbai, felt that handset costs should not be a worrying point, as market forces and volumes would drive the handset costs down. He also emphasized that 3G should not be looked at from a high-end application perspective. “Let's not only look at high end applications such video streaming, you can also have a simple application such location-based service. 3G is not only adding mobility to the Internet it is more than that,'' he added. Referring to the success of site sharing among operators in India, Gupte said that 60% of the cost of 3G network can be shared by operators. “If this is achieved, 3G can surely be a low cost solution,” he added.

Session 4: Content-Enablers and Opportunities

Initiating the discussion on the session on content enablers and opportunities, Amit Dev, director-Technologies and Content, Time Broadband, said that 3G is a great opportunity both in terms of content and access. “Most of the countries where 3G is already there have really done more than just adding revenue to the ARPU scale. The countries' economy, executive efficiency and outlook has been multiplied and catalyzed by the broadband delivery and communication and interactive services, which can ride on 3G. Actually the value is there,” he pointed out.

Samir Bangara, VP, Indiagames, said that it's not too much about technology, but the user experience. Taking the example of multi-player and connected experience in gaming, he pointed out that the existing platform solutions are not necessarily providing the users the best experience. This should improve on 3G leading to larger adoption of gaming.

Arun Gupta, COO, Mauj, said that besides the speed, operatvors in India need to enable offnet portals that is now increasingly driving the business in lot of countries such as the US and Europe. “Operators need to enable third party portals. Besides billing, reconciliation and settlement issues also need to be taken care of in order to improve the entire mobile user experience,'' he said.

Vikas Mittersain, MD, Nazara Technologies, was of the view that unlike in the 2 or 2.5G where in 90% of revenues comes from voice and just 10 per cent from data and content, it's going to be opposite in 3. And that's where the opportunity lies for content developers, he said. He hoped that content developers would become more important for operators in that scenario.

Ishwar Jha, head-IT, Zee Networks, wondered if there is a content readiness in terms of putting them on the mobile platform. The second problem, according to him, is that of standardization of content so that they can be delivered to any mobile device. Knowing and understanding what kind of content consumers actually want is also important, according to Jha.

Pankaj Sethi, VP-Content and Application, Tata Teleservices, said that the large owners of content and also the large owners of brands worldwide who have spent years establishing the brand may ask for off portal present. This is because they feel that brand is important and keeping control of that would be valuable. He also talked about several hurdles that need to be crossed.

Stating that it is not the question of technology, Krishna Durba, head-sales and marketing (Application Solutions and Content) Reliance Infocomm, said that the key challenge is what is: the content that can be consumed in the largest quantity? “That will address whole lot issues in terms of revenue or value for everybody in the content value chain,'' he added. He felt that the mobile screen seems to be converging more towards TV then Internet. Given that, he added, in 3G consumer demand would be more for rich media services.

Cautioning that these are early days for 3G, Neeraj Roy, MD, Hungama, said that there is going to be lot of experimentation. A lot has to be done with the way content is marketed, as a consumer would surely need a trigger to download a content, he said.

Sonia Sharma           
sonias@cybermedia.co.in