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Lt Gen SP Kochhar, DG, COAI, has written to K Rajaraman, Secretary, DoT, recommending that 5Gi be made a part of 3GPP. According to COAI, this would ensure that telcos can adopt 5Gi early on and can benefit from the economies of scale.
Make 5Gi part of 3GPP - COAI
In the letter, Lt. Gen. SP Kochar, said, "chipsets for 5Gi are yet to be developed and even if vendors agree to develop those, it will take one to three years to develop them, and that too at a very high cost as these will be used only in India given that the standard is not globally harmonized, hence not accepted by any other country".
Talking about the issues that might cause, he added, "this may put the consumer at a burden if sufficient options are not available for device procurement as the operators will also have to undergo additional constraints in validating technologies that are uncommon".
Lt. Gen. Kochar also added that since no devices run the 5Gi standards, telcos can't conduct tests for the same.
The 5Gi Issue
5Gi represents India's first ITU-approved standard. Developed by TSDSI, along with IITs and other academic institutions across the country, the standard specializes in rural applications. Therefore, it makes 5Gi a very India-specific telecommunications standard.
AS such, the government is very keen on 5Gi and its adoption in the telecom industry. The DoT even asked the telcos to run trials using 5Gi in the ongoing 5G trials. However, the telcos have called the standard "risky" and no one has bothered to run tests using 5Gi so far.
In August, the telcos and vendors wrote to the DoT, telling that the 3GPP and 5Gi standards were "non-interoperable". Therefore, devices developed using the 3GPP standard won't work on networks using 5Gi and vice versa.
On its part, the TSDSI has refuted the telcos' claims. Bhaskar Ramamurthi, Director, IIT Madras, and former chairperson, TSDSI, said, "5G handsets require only minor firmware and software changes to become 5G+5Gi handsets, which will not lead to an increase in costs as confirmed by some handset solution providers and operators".
He further added, "given the scale of the Indian market in terms of the number of (mobile) connections and growth rate, the initial development cost of making these modifications is modest as it will get amortized very quickly".
In essence, the telcos also argue that the global standards will allow economies of scale, bringing down gear costs. 5Gi won't allow for the same and hence increase 5G prices. Lt. Gen. Kochar's remarks also echoed the same sentiment. "Mandating 5Gi standard with higher device cost and additional CapEx for telcos would not be justified at a time when 3GPP’s 5G standard provides better results", he said.