Bharti Airtel will cover all towns in urban regions as well as key rural areas in India by March 2024
Indian telecom operator Bharti Airtel is currently testing 5G Standalone (SA) technology with the aim of using it to cover certain uses cases for enterprises, local press reported.
“While these use cases are very niche today, we are already doing our trials to serve customers where needed. We are also testing our mmWave spectrum for fixed wireless access. You will hear more about our plans on FWA in the coming months,” said Vittal.
According to the telco’s managing director, Gopal Vittal, Bharti Airtel will cover all towns in urban regions as well as key rural areas in India by March 2024.
The executive also said Xiaomi, Oppo, Vivo and Realme devices support Airtel’s 5G Non-Standalone network, while the devices manufactured by Samsung and OnePlus will be fully ready to support Airtel’s 5G in the next couple of weeks.
Last month, Airtel announced the launch of 5G services in Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Siliguri, Nagpur and Varanasi.
Bharti Airtel is chiefly using equipment from Ericsson, Nokia and Samsung for the provision of 5G services. The Indian operator secured a total of 19,800 megahertz of spectrum in the 900 MHz, 1.8 GHz, 2.1 GHz, 3.3 GHz and 26 GHz bands in a recent auction carried out by the Indian government.
Earlier this week, Bharti Airtel announced that it has already reached 1 million unique 5G subscribers in less than 30 days since it had commercially launched this technology in certain areas of the country.
Rival telco Reliance Jio Infocomm had also recently announced the launch of the beta trial of its 5G services in Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata and Varanasi. The carrier confirmed that its 5G service will be offered through 5G Standalone architecture and through a mix of wireless spectrum across the 700 MHz, 3.5 GHz and 26 GHz bands.
Meanwhile, Vodafone Idea is currently in talks with several venders for the supply of 5G gear. The telco is also seeking to obtain financial resoirces for the launch of its 5G network.
More than 200 Indian cities are expected to get 5G service in the next six months, and 5G services could be available in 80-90% of the country in the next two years.
In related news, Bharti Airtel also announced it has deployed 5G cell sites at the new terminal of the Kempegowda International Airport in the city of Bengaluru. This is the first airport in India to get 5G coverage, the telco said.
Airtel said that customers travelling from the new terminal will now get 5G coverage in the arrival and departure terminals, lounges, boarding gates, migration and immigration areas, security gates, baggage claim areas.
