Spectrum Auction: Winners And Losers

Now that the big bang event is over, where does the consumer stand in the new scenario?

- Taru Bhatia

The biggest ever telecom spectrum auction is over, and again it’s time to take stock. The government, of course, has failed miserably to meet its targets – due to a variety of reasons. The industry, already amid a price war thanks to the entry of Reliance Jio, has not been able to shell out much for the new bands on offer. The consumer, however, looks forward to better services and some relief from existing problems like call drops. Will that hope materialise soon?

Rajan Mathews, director general, Cellular Operations Association of India (COAI), believes that the issues concerning network including call drops will be solved now, but it will take time. "Once the spectrum is allocated, we have to put it into operation, part of which means that you have to build cell towers. So we have to wait for six nine months to see the complete impact of this,” he says.

He feels that now the operators have adequate amount of spectrum. Telecom experts, however, say that lack of spectrum was not the primary issue behind call drops.

"In places like Delhi, a high-density mobile area, there are gaps in the network and poor signal. Call drops issue is more about lack of mobile phone towers and poor utilisation of spectrum than inadequacy of spectrum,” says Prabir Purkayastha, chair person, Knowledge Commons, and vice-president, Free Software Movement of India.

He blames service providers for ignoring voice services as it no longer serves them good margins.

Operators are shifting towards data service since it has become a lucrative market lately. Hence, the focus on voice service is going down causing frequent call drops, Purkayastha explains. "Operators have really not upgraded their voice network and they are treating it as a legacy operation, which after sometime won’t get them enough money,” he says.