Ganesh Kendale
Bharti Airtel chairman Sunil Mittal teamed up with rival Mukesh Ambani-led Jio, advocating satellite companies to pay license fees and buy spectrum the same way as telecom operators. Speaking at India Mobile Conference 2024 (IMC), Mittal said that the existing telecom companies will take satellite services into the remotest parts. Last week, Reliance Jio wrote a letter to telecom minister Jyotiraditya Scindia opposing the telecom regulator TRAI’s recommendation of satellite broadband being allocated and not auctioned.
What Airtel Chairman Sunil Mittal said
“Telecom companies around the globe have done seminal work in connecting the world. They will take the satellite services into the remotest parts of the nations through the USO program and directly through themselves. The satellite companies who have ambitions to come into urban areas serving elite retail customers just need to take the telecom licenses like everybody with the same conditions and will have to buy the spectrum and pay license fees as the telecom players,” Mittal said.
“And those satellite companies who have ambitions to come into urban areas, serving retail customers, just need to pay the telecom licenses like everyone else. They are bound to the same conditions.
“They need to buy the spectrum as the telecom companies do, and need to pay the license as the telecom companies do, and also secure the networks of the telecom companies,” he said.
Jio writes letter to Telecom Minister
In its letter to telecom minister Jyotiraditya Scindia, Jio highlighted the growing interest of global satellite constellations like Starlink, Amazon Kuiper, and its own joint venture with SES in India. These constellations are expected to offer satellite-based communication services, directly competing with terrestrial networks.
Jio argued that since terrestrial networks acquire spectrum through auctions, a similar process should be adopted for satellite services to ensure fair competition. The company previously addressed this concern to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) but received no favorable response.
