Recent International Telecommunication Union (ITU) data reveals that the success of India’s telecom revolution is restricted to mobile voice with very little to showcase in fixed line and internet access, or high-speed broadband. For a country that is the global IT and ITeS capital or the world’s back office, its own internet penetration remains one of the lowest in the world. Forecasts are equally uninspiring, projecting high-speed internet access to remain abysmal till 2012.

Internet broadband penetration will limp along to eventually reach a measly 3.9 connections for every 100 citizens by 2012. Even though internet users may be multiple times higher, actual broadband penetration will not exceed 18.1 million at the beginning of the next decade. In contrast, mobile telephony will add as many as 350 million subscribers during this five-year period to end at roughly 615 million by mid 2012.

These forecasts fall short of the government’s conservative target of 20 million high-speed internet subscribers by 2010-end. India’s broadband penetration is roughly 4.5 million subscribers. Even with a 300% growth rate over the next five years, the sector will fall short of the 50 million mark by 2012.

Read the full story in The Times of India here.

However, while Bangladesh’s policy is designed to attract fresh competition by keeping its existing operators and their shareholders (foreign and Bangladeshi) out of the spectrum bids, India has opted for a different route.

India has restricted BWA bidding to only those who either hold an ISP or a unified access service (UAS) licence, thereby either forcing companies to acquire ISP/UAS licenses before the bidding or keeping away new entrants who are unable to acquire such licences due to price or time constraints.

“Other contrasts are equally striking and show up uncomfortable flaws with India’s auction guidelines,” says a telecom analyst. While India’s BWA guidelines are just four pages, Bangladesh’s is a 57-page invitation for applications for grant of licence. This includes a 30-page licence agreement and detailed terms of interconnection/tariffs.

Read the full story in The Times of India here.

LIRNEasia saw BTRC’s move to issue three new Broadband Wireless Access (BWA) licenses a positive development, as Bangladesh is certainly not a country that can boast of quality and affordable broadband.

This is what we learnt from our research:

Exceptionally high cost of broadband remains a key barrier that prevents the development of the BPO industry in Bangladesh. This is apparent when the prices are compared with similar packages offered by the operators in neighbouring countries. The annual cost of the basic office broadband package offered by Grameen Cybernet Ltd is USD 8,016. This is more than thirty times when compared with the equivalent in India (and 67 times that of EU average). These prices indicate a serious mismatch between demand and supply. So opening the market for broadband services is commendable, but the true impact will be felt only if this results in significant drop in prices.

We are glad to find our trademark in multiple places in the RFP document, specifically in following imrpovements (from the earlier one):

1. Operators should now guarantee QoS not just in last mile, but at least till the first foreign entry point, by purchasing adequate international bandwidth. (Earlier the focus was only on last mile.)

2. Contention ratios and download/upload speed ratios are defined, ensuring capacity increase parallel to the number of subscribers

3. Connectivity need not be confined to WiMax (except in Dhaka and Chittagong Metropolitan area). Operators have the flexibility in using other media (eg Fiber or Copper wires) in conjunction

4. Operators have to ensure QoS as per BTRC guidelines. There will be regular monitoring. (Glad to learn that BTRC will an eye on broadband QoSE! Not many regulators have!)

5. Operators now have a better understanding on backbone/backhaul design. The system can be point-to-multipoint or mesh radio systems consisting of BWA distribution hub stations and their associated subscriber stations (or BWA access devices).

Our complete response is here.

With this, is it too much to expect the same reaction from Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of Sri Lanka too for our response on the ‘Planning and Implementation of a National Backbone Network (NBN)’?

In what it described as its “third consultation” on broadband wireless access, OFTA says it wants to allocate 85MHz of spectrum between 2.305 and 2.390GHz for broadband wireless, with a small guard band separating it from electronic news gathering/outside broadcast services at 2.20-2.29Ghz and the unlicensed 2.4-2.4835GHz band. Read more.