Elon Musk's Starlink gets approval to start operations in India, but with a 'expiry date' for now
's
satellite internet service
Starlink has cleared its final regulatory hurdle for launching
commercial broadband
in India.
Starlink
has now received the important approval from the Indian National Space Promotion and Authorization Centre (IN-SPACe). After this final approval, Starlink becomes the third satcom operator after Bharti-backed Eutelsat OneWeb and the Reliance Jio-SES joint venture, to receive all the necessary clearances for operating in the Indian market.
Starlink's Starlink's Gen 1 low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellite constellation, which comprises 4,408 satellites capable of delivering 600 Gbps throughput across India. Last month, Starlink obtained its Global Mobile Personal Communication by Satellite (GMPCS) permit.
Starlink's India approval comes with an expiry date
The satellite internet service owned by Elon Musk's SpaceX, has cleared all the regulatory hurdles, but till the company will have to wait for the full-scale commercial launch of its service. Like the other competitors, Starlink will also have to mandatorily procure trial spectrum and meet security compliances set by the
Department of Telecommunications
(DoT) before being allowed to start its services commercially.
Eutelsat OneWeb and the Jio-SES JV received their trial spectrums last year and they also received an extension of six months. Now both the operators are waiting for their final security compliance approval. DoT is also expected to issue trial spectrum to Starlink.
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On the basis of TRAI's recommendations, DoT is also expected to soon finalize pricing and allocation rules for satellite spectrum. TRAI has proposed an administrative allocation model with a 4% fee on adjusted gross revenue (AGR) for five years. Urban users may face an additional ₹500 per subscriber annually, while rural users are exempt.
Starlink in India may face hurdles
However, a widespread adoption for Starlink in India may face hurdles, particularly concerning hardware costs. Globally, Starlink's hardware kits range from $250 (approx. Rs 21,300) to $380 (approx. Rs 32,400). This represents a significant upfront investment compared to existing Indian home broadband offerings, which typically feature much lower hardware costs, provide speeds up to 1 Gbps, and often bundle Over-The-Top (OTT) app subscriptions.
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