Future hazy for BharatNet as Starlink, Kuiper eye rural India's connectivity

Time of India

4 days ago

Mumbai: India's ambitious BharatNet project, seeking to link the hinterland with fibre-based broadband, now faces a question mark over relevance in the face of satellite communications, as Elon Musk-owned Starlink and Amazon's Kuiper are expected to provide the crucial missing piece in the rural connectivity jigsaw.'Questions are being raised if the model of BharatNet could be tweaked to include satcom as a means besides fibre,' one person aware of the line of thinking at BharatNet said.While fibre companies say BharatNet can only be driven by that mode of connecting rural homes, satcom company Hughes indicated it could be a hybrid model in the future, urging the government to consider subsidies for both technologies.
The advent of satcom, coupled with the telcos' focus on growing wireless home connections, have also led to some doubts whether fibre deployment in the country could slow down.
But fibre cable companies like
Sterlite Technologies
and Microscan have countered that in an underpenetrated market like India, fibre connectivity has immense headroom for deployment in data centres, telecom towers, etc.
Pranav Roach, president of Hughes Network Systems India, said that both satellite communication and
fiber connectivity
possess unique advantages, and can co-exist as both are essential
"The government could reconsider its approach to capital expenditure deployment and subsidies for both technologies. For example, in remote or underserved areas with lower data requirements, subsidizing the cost of satcom equipment could be a beneficial strategy,' Roach said.
According to Avendus Capital, data centres alone will unlock a fibre demand of $10 billion capital investment over next few years. Even telecom tower fiberisation in India is low at 44%. The opportunity size of fiberizing over half a million towers coupled with building requisite backhaul routes would entice a capital outlay of over $30 billion in the next decade, it said.
Fiber Alone?
'We are absolutely convinced that BharatNet project will be based on fiber,' said Ankit Agarwal, managing director at
Sterlite Technologies
, which has been awarded Rs 2600 crore tender to deploy optical fibre in Jammu & Kashmir under the ongoing third phase of BharatNet totalling Rs 60,000 crore.
He reaffirmed that there are no delays or changes in BharatNet timelines.
'There may be some pockets, 1-2% of the gram panchayats which are not financially viable to connect through optical fiber or just physically not viable. There may be some satellites deployed. But, given the capability of speeds, cost, latency, we believe, fiber will remain the key technology going forward,' he said.
Prateek Jhawar, MD and Head - Infrastructure and Real Assets Investment Banking, Avendus Capital echoed the sentiment.
'We believe the future holds a hybrid, densely knit fibre network complemented by large satcom deployments…,' he said.
Satellite connectivity is susceptible to natural interferences like weather conditions (e.g. dense clouds, rains, storms etc.) and peak time congestion, he added.
Leading satcom operators like OneWeb, Starlink and Hughes offer internet speeds ranging from 50-500 Mbps whereas terrestrial networks can speed upto 1Gbps, data from JM Financial showed.
Mumbai-based Fibre infrastructure company Microscan said that BharatNet intends to connect government Zilla Parishads and post offices, which will not be possible on satcom.
'BharatNet intends to provide 100 Mbps at a very affordable monthly rate around Rs 300 with very less one time cost. Whereas satcom broadband will be useful in forests, ships, mines, aircrafts and rural areas where 4G/5G and fiber broadband is still a challenge,' said Sandeep Donde, MD & CEO, Microscan.
Infact, the company views satcom as an opportunity as they will require a huge fiber network with high bandwidth capacity to connect their base stations to the data centres across India which will be their international gateways, Donde explained.