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Aircel all set to launch mass 4G services by December to counter Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel

NEW DELHI: Mobile phone operator Aircel is preparing to launch mass market 4G LTE services by the end of this year, as it looks to stay relevant in a market which has already seen a pan-India services launch by Bharti Airtel, and is set for similar launches by Reliance Jio, Vodafone and Idea Cellular.

“In terms of 4G mobility, we will be here sooner than later. We are hopeful of launching 4G for our retail customers by the end of this calendar year,” Sameer Dave, Chief Technology Officer of Aircel, told ET.

The Chennai-headquartered company holds 20 MHz of spectrum in the 2300 MHz (4G) band across Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Bihar, Odisha, Assam, the North East and Jammu & Kashmir.

Aircel commercially launched 4G services in six of the eight circles for enterprise customers. “Enterprise is a key focus for us. We have a large customer base in enterprise, which is growing pretty strong. Their expectations are consistent quality, high uptime and high throughput, which we are able to provide wherever we have 4G licences,” said Dave.

READ MORE: 4G is going to do what voice did to the Indian telecom industry: Aircel CTO Sameer Dave

Asked about the rivalry with other 4G players, Dave said that more competition will drive quality of services (QoS) and will be beneficial for end customers. “We are ready for that (competition).”

On 4G launch in its remaining two circles, Dave said Aircel has a minimum rollout obligation with the telecom department with which it complies, and will roll out accordingly.

Bharti Airtel, India’s largest telecom company, offers pan-India 4G, and is expanding. Mukesh Ambani-owned Reliance Jio, the only company with pan-India 4G spectrum, along with Vodafone and Idea Cellular will also to start offering 4G services by December this year.

The company, which has been facing financial challenges over the years, has tried to bring in efficiencies in a bid to turn positive at the operating level. It had previously reported to be in talks with companies such as Airtel for selling its 4G licences but nothing has materialized so far. Some say, Aircel could be a big player once spectrum sharing and trading rules — recently passed by the Cabinet — are notified.
It currently has over 3 million 3G customers, and is aggressively investing in network expansion and transformation to improve 3G data services, and to overcome the call drops menace.

READ MORE: Call drops: Aircel bolsters network with 13000 new cell sites

“Call drop is the main focus area, and we are addressing that with our network expansion. Network rollout, increasing the backhaul capacity and optimsation of the network are the three key focus areas for us, and major Capex and Opex are going towards these,” Dave said.

According to him, awareness on EMF radiation is also an issue, which has impacted the network expansion so far. He said that allowing telcos to put towers on government and defense buildings is a very positive step by the government. “We should be able to get over this hump of negativity about EMF, and people will be able to welcome telcos to come and install BTS on their buildings,” he said.

He also added that Aircel is also facing backhaul issue is fiber cuts throughout the network. “A lot of road work is going on and metro lines are being expanded, due to which fiber cut has become a perennial issue for us. That is something which is not in the domain of operators, but still we are seeing how far we can mitigate back. These cuts also add to the ongoing call drop issue,” he explained.

Aircel has rolled out 7400 sites across the country, and will deploy 5400 more sites by the December 2015 end, taking the total count to 13000, up from 6000 sites that it added during the last calendar year.

Out of the 13000 sites, 5300 sites are 2G and the remaining 7700 are 3G and 4G sites combined.

While the 3G sites are planned primarily in regions such as Chennai, rest of Tamil Nadu, Kolkata, rest of West Bengal and Odisha. The focus for the 2G network expansion is regions such as Delhi, Bihar and Rajasthan to improve network performance.

“Wherever we have 4G licenses, we are putting multi-RAN with 3G and 4G capabilities,” Dave said. He however declined to share Capex and Opex plan for the ongoing financial year.

Source: ETTelecom

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