India : Telecom & Broadband Growth

India has become the unique example of telecom success in both GSM and CDMA. Indian operators have changed the equations of the telecom market. Earlier vendors used to always have the upper hand now they understand that they have to provide customized contracts and service and act as partners, cos India is a serious market and the opportunities are available starting from scratch - i.e at the level of Implementation phase. Thats why, you not only see implementations but India also becoming the test-bed or early implementator of some great telecom and broadband technologies. Every operator and vendor is now eyeing these 'Value Addition' technology and market and we will witness lots of new jargons in coming times like Wi-Fi, Wi-Max, EDGE, EV-DO, etc, etc.

The Indian telecom sector grew to 79.4 million customers at the end of May'04 - a 39 percent annual growth that came mainly by the doubling mobile users. A recent paper by Telecom.paper.nl estimates (paid subscription) that there are 0.4 internet, 0.2 broadband connections per 100 people in India.

The broadband sector is still at a very confusing stage since there is not a single technology which has stabilized, every vendor and every operator is singing a different tune. Even the discussion on connection to customer (medium) is divided into Wirelss / Copper / Fibre and Ethernet. The Telecom Equipment Manufacturers Association (TEMA) has formed the India Broadband Forum primarily to provide technical, strategic, and marketing support to its member organizations venturing in the development of broadband products and services.

The next phase will the coming of foreign Telecom / Networking / Broadband services for the need of outsourcing i.e Remote Management and Monitoring and other services. For example a recent announcement from COLT telecom to move jobs from Germany and UK to India. India is not only providing the manpower in the services market but there are many companies like Notel, Lucent, Cisco, Qualcomm, Juniper, etc for which India has become the R&D base also, for both the software and hardware.