100 5G Labs On The Cards: Here’s What’s In It For Startups

The Union Budget 2022-23 was the second budget in a row to talk about 5G and the government’s plans for it.

Last year, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced the auction of the 5G spectrum (which fetched the government upwards of INR 1.5 Lakh Cr) and set the target to complete its rollout by the end of FY23.

However, as of now, things seem to be moving slowly but steadily, with Jio and Airtel aiming to complete their 5G rollouts by December 2023, and Vi and BSNL soon to join the race.

This year, Sitharaman announced that the government would set up 100 labs in engineering institutions across the country to develop applications for the next-gen mobile network “to realise a new range of opportunities, business models and employment potential.”

Talking about the potential use cases, Sitharaman said, “The labs will cover, among others, applications such as smart classrooms, precision farming, intelligent transport systems and healthcare applications.”

Lt. Gen. Dr S.P. Kochhar, director general of the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), welcomed the announcement of the setting up of 5G labs, along with three centres of excellence for artificial intelligence (AI) on the cards. He called the development “progressive steps” that would “help fuel the proliferation of 5G and its ecosystem in the country.”

“We feel that the government’s support for this industry is crucial, especially when 5G is slated to be an enabler for several other verticals – for increasing efficiencies and output across various applications and use cases,” said Lt. Gen. Dr Kochhar.

India has taken a deep interest in telecommunications in recent years, especially in taking an increasingly important role in developing new standards and use cases for upcoming technologies in the field. At the same time, India’s startups have witnessed increasing synergy with telcos, especially for 5G tech and applications.

India’s Push For Atmanirbhar Telecom

Ever since Chinese telecom giant Huawei found itself surrounded by controversy over alleged links with the Chinese ruling party, the Indian government doubled down on its efforts to develop self-dependence in terms of telecom gear and tech.

To boost telecom gear production, the government announced a production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme with an outlay of INR 12,195 Cr in February 2021. Later that year, India announced sweeping changes in the telecom sector, helping relieve the financial stress the industry found itself in during 2021.

So far, 42 companies have got approval for the PLI and design-linked incentive (DLI) schemes for domestic manufacturing of telecom and networking equipment.

Last month, Union Minister of Communication Ashwini Vaishnaw noted that India would become a major exporter of telecom gear in the next two to three years. The push for atmanirbhar has paid dividends on the telecom front.

How Are Startups Helping Telcos Up Their Game?

The fundamentals of telecom are changing. The network infrastructure has changed dramatically over the past few years. With edge and cloud computing taking the front seat in 5G networks, telcos are looking for support.

This is where startups come into the picture – for not only traditional telecom services and 5G but also use cases such as the Internet of Things (IoT), Industrial IoT, M2M communication and smart factories, among others.

In January 2022, Airtel picked up a 25% stake in Bengaluru-based enterprise network technology startup, Lavelle Networks. Lavelle delivers SD-WAN solutions and uses cloud-based solutions to optimise, secure and manage enterprise branch networks.

Similarly, in September 2020, the Sunil Mittal-led telco picked up a strategic stake in Thiruvananthapuram-based cloud telephony startup Waybeo to offer cloud telephony services to enterprise customers.

Airtel’s most recent startup investment was in December 2022, when it picked up a stake in the marketing automation platform Lemnisk. Lemnisk’s tech would allow the telco to automate interactions with its customers across its touchpoints.

Startups have also received support from the government to develop 5G use cases and applications. Last May, Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched a 5G test bed for startups across five locations in the country to develop and test India-relevant use cases for the next-gen networks.

Telcos are looking to delegate developing tech and use cases more and more to shore up networks as 5G becomes commonplace. As such, India’s tech startups are well-placed to take advantage of an increasing opportunity in telecom and 5G.