India plans to dump 3G in favour of 4G wireless technology because 3G is not cost-effective, says Dayanidhi Maran, the country’s new minister for IT and communications. Maran announced: India plans to dump 3G in favour of 4G wireless technology because 3G is not cost-effective, says Dayanidhi Maran, the country’s new minister for IT and communications. Maran announced:
The 3G standard has evolved, but has not proved cost-effective. I therefore plan to leapfrog this generation and develop 4G technology. India has an opportunity with its large market and high technical skills to be a significant player in this field. We are going to set up a National Center for Excellence in this area.
Maran wants to focus his ministry’s efforts on making tech relevant to the lives of average Indians, not just those working in high-tech enclaves.
I believe that for communication and IT facilities to be truly relevant in India, they will have to touch the lives of villagers. There are still about 50,000 villages in India which do not have telephone facility. I would like to see that they are all connected, preferably during the current year.
On improving Internet connectivity in India:
India plans to have a national Internet exchange through which it hopes to connect all Internet service providers (ISPs) to achieve efficient Internet traffic routing, cost reduction, and improve the quality of service for the Internet users in India. The country also plans to migrate to IPv6 (Internet Protocol version 6) by 2006. Worldwide, IPv6 is being implemented on the Internet to accommodate increased number of users and take care of security concerns.
In addition to bringing voice services, the government wants to bring tele-agriculture, tele-health, and tele-education to villages. What I find strange is that in the midst of all this very progressive talk about bringing tech to the masses, the minister does not want to privatize government-owned telecom services companies such as Bharat Sanchar Nigam and Mahanagar Telephone Nigam.
I have written nothing flattering about 3G, mostly because I consider it to be a form of electronic handbag-snatching (see Vodafone UMTS service is hideously expensive). Vodafone and other European carriers are slowly rolling out 3G services with outrageous per megabyte fees. I can understand that they want to recoup the billions they spent in bidding on licenses and building out the network. But they still need to live in today’s world: Wi-Fi and WiMAX are beginning to offer alternatives and people are not going to pay those crazy fees.
India’s minister is probably the only one brave enough to come out and say it like it is. You won’t get this kind of candor from a European minister (except maybe Estonia). Many EU member states still favor their incumbent operators although they’re supposed to be enforcing unfair competition laws (note: mobile phone roaming charges are still very high despite “attempts” by the EU to do something about it).
Here are a few articles to consider about 3G’s place in the world.
What do the airphone, Iridium and 3G have in common?
Wi-Fi and WiMAX could strangle 3G
Intel COO brings bad news to 3GSM
Skype on your PDA: voice over Wi-Fi is here
Bypassing the phone company
[Source for India news: John Ribeiro, IDG News Service]
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