BBNL

On July 27, the government approved a DoT proposal for the "Revival of BSNL and merger of BBNL with BSNL"

BSNL has been saddled with steep losses (over Rs 50,000 crore in the past five years) and obsolete technology, resulting in a decline in revenues and customers

Will BBNL's merger with BSNL expedite Bharat Net project?

Bharat Broadband Nigam Ltd is being merged with BSNL. Will this merger address the problems plaguing the project and expedite it. Our next report offers some insight

The jury is out on whether the merger of two state-owned telecom companies can help step up rural broadband connectivity

BSNL-BBNL merger will not help

The government is planning to merge Bharat Broadband Nigam Limited (BBNL) with the loss-making state-run telecom operator Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) this month, a senior official has said. BSNL chairman and managing director PK Purwar at a recent event organised by the All India Graduate Engineers and Telecom officers Association (AIGETOA) said that the government is giving the telecom firm an opportunity for a turnaround. "The government has taken a policy decision that BBNL is going to be merged into BSNL. This means all work of BBNL at the pan-India level is going to come to BSNL," Purwar said at the All India Conference of AIGETOA on March 13. Referring to his meeting with the union telecom minister, Purwar said he had an hour-long meeting to this effect. BSNL already has a network of over 6.8 lakh kilometer of optical fibre cable (OFC) network. With the proposed merger, BSNL will get 5.67 lakh kilometer of optical fibre which has been laid across 1.85 lakh village ..

To offer the higher service requirement, operators would need to ensure uninterrupted power, safety of cables and so on

The Centre had approved a viability gap fund of Rs 19,041 crore for the project that aimed to connect 3.61 lakh villages across 16 states

State-run Bharat Broadband Network Limited has deferred bid dates for Rs 19,041 crore BharatNet broadband tender to September 14 after potential bidders raised more than 2,000 queries on the project. An official source told PTI that the bid dates are likely to be extended further as the queries need to be vetted by the Department of Telecom as well and the entire process may take a few weeks. According to the information published on BBNL, the bid date has been deferred from August 24 to September 14 as of now. Bharat Broadband Network Limited (BBNL) has invited global bids for the development (creation, upgradation, operation and maintenance and utilisation) of BharatNet through a public-private partnership model in nine separate packages across 16 states for a concession period of 30 years. The government has earmarked Rs 19,041 crore viability gap fund for the project. Under the project, the government plans to cover an estimated 3.61 lakh villages (including gram panchayats) .

Special purpose vehicle BBNL on Tuesday invited bids for Rs 19,041 crore BharatNet project to roll out high-speed broadband services in the rural areas across 16 states.

These telecom service providers had expressed their interest in utilizing BharatNet connectivity mainly for extending their 4G/ LTE mobile services

Bharat Broadband Nigam Limited (BBNL) had allocated around 70 per cent of rural broadband network roll-out work to BSNL

Bharat Broadband Nigam Limited (BBNL) had allocated around 70 per cent of rural broadband network roll-out work to BSNL and about 15 per cent of work to Railtel and Powergrid each