Bharti Airtel, the country’s largest telecom service provider, on Tuesday launched the country’s first 4G service in Kolkata. It will offer data speeds more than 10 times faster than 3G but at nearly the same tariff.
Airtel is offering three packs: the Breakfree plan for Rs 999 for free data usage quota of six GB (giga bytes), the Breakfree Max plan worth Rs 1,399 with free data usage of nine GB, and the Breakfree Ultra plan worth Rs 1,999 allowing free data usage of up to 18 GB. In contrast, it has only one postpaid data plan on the data card in 3G, which is at Rs 950 per month for six GB. Vodafone’s data pack is for Rs 3,250 for six GB but with a six-month validity.
A normal movie requires about 300-500 MB (mega bytes) of space and a DVD quality movie about 1.5-2 GB. With 4G services, one would not have to spend hours in downloading a movie from the internet.
However, one would have to fork out more for the dongles or data cards that are more expensive, priced Rs 7,999, and indoor-use devices with Wi-fi, priced Rs 7,750. A typical Huawei Airtel 3.6 Mbps (mega bits per second) 3G data card is priced Rs 2,099 while the Airtel 7.2 Mbps 3G data card is available at Rs 2,499. However, 4G currently does not offer voice services.
Airtel’s move to launch the service comes much ahead of its tough new rival, Reliance Industries, which has a pan-India licence through Infotel Ltd and spectrum for 4G services. It will launch services some time in the first quarter of the next financial year. Those in the know say the company would initially connect over 100 cities.
Telecom operators are increasingly banking on 4G, especially after the slow start of 3G services in the country. 3G services, despite being available for more than 18 months, have been able to attract only 15-20 million customers across the country. Operators had paid a staggering Rs 65,000 crore for 3G spectrum.
Sanjay Kapoor, CEO of Bharti Airtel India and south Asia, present at the occasion with communication minister Kapil Sibal, who launched the service, said: “We expect 4G to deliver speeds of 10-15 Mbps, 10 times higher than those of 3G, which are 1.5-2 Mbps on average.”
Talking about the market, Kapoor added: “Speed will be the killer application. There is pent-up demand for such high-speed data services and we want to be an end-to-end broadband provider,” he added. While 4G networks could theoretically offer download speeds as high as 100 Mbps, the actual delivered speed would always depend on the number of consumers and the kind of applications used at a time, he said.
| THE PLANS TO CHOOSE FROM | ||||
| Bharti’s 4G plan | Rental (Rs) | Free usage (GB) | Charge after quota | Speed after quota (Kbps) |
| Breakfree | 999 | 6 | - | 128 |
| Breakfree Max | 1,399 | 9 | - | 128 |
| Breakfree Ultra | 1,999 | 18 | - | 128 |
| 4G dongles or data cards are priced Rs 7,999 and indoor-use devices with Wi-fi Rs 7,750 | ||||
Airtel has 4G licences in four circles, including Kolkata, Maharashtra, Punjab and Karnataka. The service has been launched in Kolkata and Bangalore will be next. “There should be more auctions coming soon. Watch this space; we are not going to be confined to four circles. The minister said that there will be more auctions coming through in BWA and broadband, we will be in one way or the other looking to expand our presence,” said group chairman Sunil Mittal.