OneWeb waiting to launch satellite services, TRAI paper another month away

The department of telecommunications (DoT) is unlikely to issue any provisional or interim spectrum to companies such as Eutelsat OneWeb and Jio to commercially roll out their satellite internet services in the country, people in the know said. The government is expected to wait for the recommendations of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) before it decides to allocate spectrum to the satellite firms administratively.

“The reference to Trai on defining the terms and conditions as well as pricing for the satellite spectrum has been sent. We will follow the complete process and are not considering any interim arrangement as of now,” an official aware of the matter said.

The stance by the DoT assumes significance as the companies, especially Bharti-backed Eutelsat OneWeb, have urged the government to provisionally allot them the spectrum till the time the Trai completes the consultation process on pricing and other terms. An interim arrangement would have given the companies an opportunity to start their services immediately and the same would have started revenue streams for them from the Indian market, an industry executive said. The Trai is yet to issue a consultation paper on the subject. In August, Trai chairman Anil Lahoti said it should take about a month to issue the consultation paper.

Eutelsat OneWeb and Jio are the frontrunners in the satellite communication service race. Both the companies have received necessary clearances from the authorities. The government is also reviewing applications of Elon Musk-owned Starlink and Amazon’s Kuiper. Last month, Bharti Enterprises chairman Sunil Bharti Mittal said the company had requested the government to accelerate the process because it is much-needed, especially by the government agencies in remote areas.

“The terminals are in India, we are just waiting…there is nothing we can do because we can’t light it up other than our test case, which has been approved. We can’t go commercial until we have the approvals,” Mittal said at a media interaction. “In fact, we have given an undertaking to the DoT that you can even give us permission in the interim, and whatever the final decision is, we will comply with that…It is a wait from the DoT now. We are fully ready,” he added.

The Telecom Act has cleared the way for allocation of spectrum for satellite communication services through the administrative route. However, allocation can be done only after the rules governing the same are framed, which will be done after the Trai’s recommendations on the subject. The rules will define the exact usage norms for satellite services in India.

The satellite firms have proposed to the government to allow them to serve other nations as well as using their operational setup in India. The companies want the government to include this permission as part of the new authorisation regime for the telecommunications sector, which is in the works under the provisions of the telecom Act. The same once approved would also require amendment in the global mobile personal communication by satellite (GMPCS) licence, required by companies to provide satellite internet services in the country.

Satellite services are different from telecom services as the former are focussed on internet broadband services largely in low-lying areas where telecom services are difficult to provide. Financial Express