India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently met with the United States (US) President Joe Biden in Tokyo. India and US together launched an initiative on Critical and Emerging Technologies (iCET) for facilitating outcome-oriented cooperation. iCET, co-led by India’s National Security Council Secretariat and US National Security Council, would forge closer linkages between academia, government, and the industry of the two countries in areas such as 5G/6G, biotech, semiconductors, space, quantum computing, and AI (artificial intelligence).
India Working Aggressively Towards 5G
While there has been a significant delay in launching 5G networks in India, the country is working aggressively towards forming new policies and improving the telecom sector’s health for facilitating a good ground for the telcos to launch next-generation network technology. The 5G spectrum auction is also pretty close and all that the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) is waiting for is the final decision from the cabinet. Forming new partnerships in the domain of emerging technology such as 5G/6G, AI, and more will enable India in advancing towards the future faster. Countries such as the US have already launched 5G networks and thus extensive data sets would be available with the US government around 5G which India could benefit from. For 6G, India has already started working and has set an eye on being a global leader with network technology. India has already formed multiple partnerships with governments of other nations for working on 6G network technology. This partnership with the US is just the cherry on the cake. Post the spectrum auction, the 5G networks in India are expected to go live by August 15, 2022. The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) wants the 5G networks to be launched by this Independence Day. But looking at the pace at which things are rolling, it might be hard for the telcos to do so unless the DoT can schedule the spectrum auction in mid-July. In that case, we might get to see live commercial 5G networks in some parts of the country.
