India has crossed the 200 mn telephone mark and is presently number one in the world in terms of net mobile additions. The country is adding around 6-7 mn subscribers every month. India has also surpassed China's net additions pegged at around 5-6 mn in Q4 2006. And this addition is expected to continue for at least a couple of years as we are still at a tele-density of 19. However, the full potential is not yet realized in urban as well as rural areas, as we have covered only 50-55% of India's geography.

The growth in mobile additions is astounding, but we are way below the quality benchmarks laid by TRAI (Telecom Regulatory Authority of India), which is at 95% for network availability. The recent VOICE & DATA Mobile Users' Satisfaction Survey 2006 shows that there has been a large-scale drop in the satisfaction of subscribers of most service providers. It seems the operators have not been able to devote time and effort to increase the satisfaction level. The scenario remains same across different circles-irrespective of operators. The latest survey also shows that there has been quality of service (QoS) deterioration in metros whereas there are signs of improvement in A circle. In B and C circles, only one operator has shown signs of improvement.

Challenges
The challenge before service provider is to offer new and unique services to a large audience and in turn generate more revenue. Another challenge is how does one take care of new technologies in terms of deployment in different geographies, while utilizing the old technologies optimally. Apart from this, the focus is on continuous scaling and optimization of the network to guarantee a minimum threshold in terms of quality of service for existing services as well as new upcoming technologies.

With PLC (product life cycle) decreasing, the biggest challenge for CTO's is reduced time to market product/solutions. And with increased competition and in this fast changing technology world, telecom players are under pressure to come up with new products in the shortest possible time and also at a lowered cost.

On the manufacturing front, there is a wide gap between India's mobile intake and production. Presently, we are only manufacturing 15%-20% of the total requirement and it is still a long way to go, as one has to talk about exports if we plan to ramp up manufacturing in the country. There have been a lot of announcements by different vendors, but one has to see an increase in production statistics of all the vendors plus EMS players in the country. Presently, the focus is more on low cost handsets and assembly of handsets. Even on the infrastructure front, it is more of assembly rather than doing full-fledged manufacturing. Once we start manufacturing components in India, we will realize the real potential to export mid quality handsets plus BTS.

The biggest challenge is the product time-to-market. Increased competition and fast changing technologies mean that telecom players are under pressure to come up with new products in the shortest possible time. Adding to that is consumer demand for lowering costs at the same time as improving technology. Product testing is an integrated part of its life cycle and hence T&M has to cater to this demand. T&M is generally considered to be the 'necessary evil' in product development-everyone wants to do away with it, but no one can live without it.

Presently, the manufacturers are focusing on low cost phones, but they are not focusing on quality, as less number of tests is performed so that one can optimize on the cost part.

In terms of investment in T&M with respect to total investment, worldwide ratios are still on a higher side. Indian operators are still at one percent whereas internationally it is around two-three percent. An increase in percentage point has direct relevance to the quality of mobile network in a country.

For improving quality, one can use equipments like interference elimination, network optimization and testers

Solutions
T&M players have an advantage as they always work at the leading edge right from the time the product hits the lab for testing. Even when the product is being manufactured, T&M is used for calibration and quality control. And on the maintenance side, T&M is used mainly for rectification of error. T&M products are also used for network deployment. So, T&M players focus on validating, testing, deployment and optimization. T&M plays a critical role right from early design stages to end-of-line manufacturing, as there is a need to enhance productivity and also increase the quality of product.

The T&M players provide flexible and reconfigurable automation tools helping in reusability of hardware, flexibility and customizability for different test sets. Combining these benefits helps in reducing cost and keeps a check on quality. With handheld testers, the service providers and manufacturers get increased productivity whereas one box tester helps in further improvement in throughput and bringing down the cost of tests. Handhelds helps in bringing down the costs of the tests and the time.

For improving quality, one can use equipments like interference elimination, network optimization and testers. So, complete suites of products for improving quality are: spectrum analyzers, signal generators, and power meters and all these help in calibration as well as quality control. Drive test solutions and base station test tools help in optimization and proper coverage planning of wireless networks deploying different technologies. In fact, there is a vast range of radio frequency/microwave/general purpose tools that can help operators to improve QoS. At the top, OSS solutions offer great insight into network quality and help in trouble-shooting at the highest level.

Operators should treat customer complaints at the customer interface points and this has to be matched with the daily status report of the switch. Corrective measures need to be taken so that quality of service is maintained irrespective of geography. Upgrdation and network optimization can help in accommodation of more people in the cell and more traffic within a particular cell site. And network optimization should be a continuous process as it helps in providing increased QoS.

For improving quality of service, the service provider has to optimize their network time to time. Call drops has to be minimized by reducing interference between two cells of the same operator or two cells of different operators. Presently, the focus is on quantity and not on quality so network optimization takes a backseat but preference has to change as we are moving toward a matured economy in terms of mobile services for metro and A circles.