5G Trials: DoT to Ask Telcos to Test 5G in Rural Areas, MTNL to Join Soon

According to an official source, the DoT is set to ask the telcos to conduct 5G trials in rural areas as well.

5G Trials to Diversify

Notably, the Big 3 of Indian telecom, Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea all received permission to conduct 5G trials in urban areas for 6 months. The telcos also received test spectrum across multiple 5G spectra, including the mmWave and 700 MHz recently.

The source, cited by ETTelecom, added that MTNL can also receive permission to do the same. This permission is subject to submission of trials fees by the state-owned telecom firm.

Speaking on the matter, the official said, "DoT will ask telecom operators to include a rural area for testing 5G applications along with their urban centres. MTNL has teamed up with C-DoT for conducting 5G trials in Delhi. They will conduct a 5G test near Najafgarh as well. They will be given a trial spectrum once they deposit the fees".

DoT has approved 5G trials with Ericsson, Nokia, Samsung and C-DOT. The department omitted all Chinese vendors from the trial. As for the trial locations, Bharti Airtel will conduct trials in Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Bengaluru. Similarly, Reliance Jio applied for trials in Delhi, Mumbai, Gujarat and Hyderabad.

The telcos will develop a plethora of use cases during the trials for the Indian situation. These use cases include telemedicine, tele-education and drone-based agriculture monitoring. The telcos will also look to test the new network on various 5G devices such as mobiles, IoT and AIoT products, among others.

For now, DoT has given a 6-month period to the telcos to run trials. This also includes a 2-month time period which allows the telcos to procure and install required infrastructure.