Indigenously Developed 6G Technology Expected To Be Deployed By 2023 Or 2024: IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw

Minister of Electronics and Information Technology, Ashwini Vaishnaw said on 23 November that India is working on a domestically developed 6G technology, intending to launch it by the end of 2023 or early 2024.

The Minister said: “6G development has already started. That will be seen somewhere in the time frame 2024 or 2023-end.”

The fourth in a series of online, agenda-setting webinars organised by the Financial Times and The Indian Express, ‘New Technology and the Green Economy: Two Trends Shaping a New India?’, Vaishnaw said requisite permissions have already been given to scientists and engineers working on the technology.

“We will have designed in India telecom software for running the networks, manufactured in India telecom equipment, served in India telecom networks which can go global,” Vaishnaw added.

Apart from 6G, the Minister stated that the debut of indigenous 5G is also planned, with the development of fundamental software for the technology expected to be completed by the third quarter of next year.

According to the Minister, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has been contacted and they have already begun the process of consultation.

Additionally, he said: “The process should end somewhere in the February-March time frame in the coming year. Then the auction process will be in Q2 of the calendar year 2022.”

The Cabinet authorised a series of nine structural and procedural adjustments earlier this year to address telecom businesses' short-term financial demands as well as long-term challenges. The government had given telecom operators the option of a four-year suspension on payment of deferred spectrum and modified gross revenue dues as part of the reforms. Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea have chosen the four-year moratorium.

When announcing the reforms in September, Vaishnaw stated that another round of adjustments would be implemented in the telecom sector to address long-standing legacy issues. According to the Minister, the government's measures have been positively appreciated and the industry is currently responding to the changes.

“A lot of stress that was there in the industry is now mitigated due to those reforms. Much more needs to be done. We are already working on another set of reforms which should come in 3-4 months,” he added.

Apart from the four-year moratorium, the government announced adjustments in September, including a streamlined auction calendar and the elimination of spectrum usage charges (SUC) from auctions, which had been a long-standing desire of private carriers.

Additionally, the telecom sector will be able to accept 100 per cent foreign direct investment through the automatic route, up from the previous limit of 49 per cent.