Coai

COAI urges licence fee cut, says telcos face double burden of AGR payments

Telecom industry body COAI on Thursday sought abolition or reduction of AGR-related fees for telcos at the earliest and pitched for lowering licence fee to 0.5-1 per cent of gross revenues. COAI argued that with the separation of spectrum from the license and its assignment at market price, the justification for imposing licence fee had ceased to exist long back. The license fee should "at best" cover the cost of administration of the license only, which is around 0.5 per cent to 1 per cent of the gross revenues, instead of the 8 per cent paid currently. COAI, whose members include Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea, said payments charged on the basis of the AGR (Adjusted Gross Revenue) from telcos, ends up being a "double whammy" for players, who, as it is, incur huge investments towards procuring the spectrum. "It is evident that Telecom Service Providers (TSPs) buy the Spectrum for utilisation through transparent auction processes, paying a substantial amount for ...

Need to frame rules on entry, exit of data from telecom network: COAI DG

The government needs to enforce rules on the entry and exit of data from Indian telecom networks, including that of Over-The-Top (OTT) players, a senior official of the industry body COAI said on Thursday. While lauding Prime Minister Narendra Modi's call on cyber security framework during the inaugural session of India Mobile Congress and ITU's WTSA, COAI Director General SP Kochhar said the government has to take lead in setting up standards for security and industry will support it. He said that the joint proposition of the government and industry can be taken up with the World Telecommunications Standardisation Assembly (WTSA). "Several elements which use telecom networks cannot be forced to comply with Indian law. We have been saying this but it is a necessity. To do that we have to enforce entry and exit of data as well as entities from Indian networks through technology. Whom we allow to enter and exit from Indian telecom networks is the government right," Kochhar said. In

Telecom service authorisation regime should retain contractual nature: COAI

Telcos also complain about AGR calculations, exclusion of OTTs in new regime

Trai's service quality rules will raise compliance and costs, says telcos

Telecom companies said the new rules will impose additional costs on them, and the benefits to consumers will be minimal

Trai issued norms without much change in challenges faced by telcos: COAI

Telecom regulator Trai's new quality of service norms with stricter provisions have come without much change in challenges that telecom operators face on ground in terms of roll-out, illegal transmitters etc, industry body COAI said on Sunday. The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) has issued new quality of service rules on Friday, making it mandatory for telecom operators to compensate subscribers in case of service outages for more than 24 hours at a district level. Trai has also increased the penal amount to Rs 1 lakh from Rs 50,000 for failing to meet each quality benchmark under the new rules. The regulator has introduced a graded penalty system of Rs 1 lakh, Rs 2 lakh, Rs 5 lakh and Rs 10 lakh for different scales of rule violations and submitting false report under revised regulations -- "The Standards of Quality of Service of Access (Wirelines and Wireless) and Broadband (Wireline and Wireless) Service Regulations, 2024". Cellular Operators Association of India ..

Expect govt to allocate 6 GHz band spectrum for 5G network expansion: COAI

Telecom industry body COAI on Wednesday said it expects the government to allocate the 6 GHz band spectrum for 5G network expansion and roll out a fair share data network usage policy to make big apps pay for the excessive traffic generated by them. COAI, whose members include Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Idea and others, released its priority wishlist for the newly formed government at the Centre on Wednesday. The body wants the government to increase the number of test labs for accelerating the process of clearing network gear to enable expeditious rollout of telecom networks. Quoting a report from the global telecom industry body GSMA, the Cellular Operators Association of India said India can save as much as USD 10 billion annually in 5G network deployment through the use of the 6 GHz spectrum. "India has made a giant leap in 6G innovations through initiatives, such as Bharat 6G Alliance and Bharat 6G Vision which envisage India to be a leader in 6G innovations and ...

Telcos collaborate with tech partners to curb unwanted calls, messages

The Centre has currently designated the 140 number series for promotional voice calls, and the 160 number series for transactional and service-related voice calls

Wi-Fi 6E: What is it and why does the COAI want a ban on these routers?

Indian telecom operators have urged the government to allocate the 6GHz band for 5G, but the broadband services providers want the entire 6GHz spectrum for improving Wi-Fi services

Telecom operators group asks govt to ban sale of unlicenced WiFi 6E routers

Cellular Operators Association of India says routers are available for sale on e-commerce platforms and through offline retailer

COAI renews demand for revenue share between telcos, traffic generator apps

Telecom industry body COAI renewed its demand for revenue share between telcos and large traffic generator apps like Netflix and Instagram, saying telecom operators would need additional fund to upgrade infrastructure to meet the increasing demand for bandwidth. In a letter to telecom secretary Neeraj Mittal, Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) said it is imperative that the Indian government takes critical note of the issue facing the telecom sector at this juncture and help create "an apt precedent for the world". The telecom industry body also said that substantial investments are required to be made by telcos for GPU (graphic processing unit)-based high-speed servers to support demand of AI-based applications as well as high definition video streaming by several apps that are also referred as larger traffic generators (LTGs). Large traffic generator apps include YouTube, Facebook, WhatsApp, Netflix, etc. LTGs, it suggested, need to share their revenue with telcos for

Cases of equipment thefts at all-time high; COAI seeks DoT's intervention

Industry body COAI on Friday sought the government's intervention on the issue of rising cases of telecom equipment theft and said telcos are incurring huge losses and expenses in replenishing equipment at affected sites, and even customers are suffering. The Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), which counts operators like Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea as its members, wrote to telecom secretary Neeraj Mittal, flagging the issue. The association has urged the Department of Telecom (DoT) to write to all State Chief Secretaries to prioritise such complaints and ensure strict action on the same. COAI also urged the DoT to issue orders for the immediate blocking of several foreign websites (including eBay, Alibaba, Telefly, Seeker816, Dorfatrade) that are "selling active equipment" suspected to have been stolen from networks of member telcos. "It is...critical that these websites are blocked immediately," COAI said. COAI requested the DoT to urgently interven

Play Store delisting: Global behemoths endangering Make in India, says COAI

While targeting Indian companies, large traffic generators are refusing to pay fair share charges, says COAI

Additional Rs 10,000 crore capex spent on OTT: COAI to Finance Ministry

In a letter to Finance Secretary Somanathan COAI said a fair charge charge would lead to Rs. 800 crore additional tax revenues

Tech corpus positive, hope for full telcos' wishlist consideration: COAI

The long-term, interest-free or low interest rate loans and focus on deep tech will further encourage the private sector to scale up research and innovation, according to COAI

Budget 2024-25: Telecom industry wants govt to junk USOF, slash duties

A clearer definition of gross revenue, GST exemption also sought

Proposed US bill to charge large apps should be adopted in India: COAI

Telecom operators want the government to adopt a bill, similar to a proposal in the US Congress, that would make large internet apps contribute to infrastructure costs to help lower broadband costs for consumers, a senior industry official said. A bill sponsored by US Senators Markwayne Mullin, Mark Kelly and Mike Crapo in US Congress last month aimed at lowering broadband costs for consumers proposed a direction to telecom regulator Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to mandate social media platforms, streaming services apps, cloud computing service providers like WhatsApp, YouTube, Netflix, Google etc to contribute to universal fund that is used for building networks. The proposed bill named, Lowering Broadband Costs for Consumers Act of 2023, has classified social media platforms, streaming service, over-the-top messaging service, video gaming service, videoconferencing service, e-commerce platform, search engines under edge services providers. Telecom industry body Cellular

India 5G rollout fastest in world but revenues not picked up: COAI DG

Rollout of 5G network in India has been the fastest in the world but revenue has not picked up as apps that are generating 80 per cent of the traffic are not paying for the network, a top official of the telecom industry body COAI said. While speaking with PTI at India Mobile Congress, Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) Director General S P Kochhar said telecom players do not want to burden consumers but someone has to bear the cost of investment being made in the network. "The 5G rollout has been very good. It has set world records with the fastest 5G rollout. But having said that, I'm a little constrained to say that the revenues for the telecom industry have not picked up," Kochhar said. He said a huge amount of capital expenditure is being invested to roll out these networks. "The private players who are rolling this out definitely expect the return on that. That unfortunately is not happening on the scale as which it should. 5G rollout has brought in 4-5 large ...

Fair share charge does not affect access to an open, free internet: COAI

Telcos' body COAI on Tuesday said the proposed 'fair share charge' does not affect access to an open and free internet, as it sought to debunk "misleading and speculative views being circulated by certain quarters" to allegedly "misguide" people. The comments by COAI assume significance as the past months have seen the telecom operators and OTTs exchange fire over the telcos' demand that large traffic-generating apps must dish out part of the revenue (fair share charge) for sustenance and upkeep of communications networks. Firing a fresh salvo in an escalating war of words, the Cellular Operators' Association of India (COAI) alleged that all concerns being raised -- including favouring one website or application, and pricing differentiation -- are devoid of facts and are speculative scenarios designed to mislead the public. Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea are members of COAI. "There is no violation of net neutrality if a peering charge is applied at an interconnection

Signature campaign 'Save the internet' based on falsehood: COAI to Trai

Recent signature campaign "Save the internet" against the proposal of network usage fee, that was signed by several startups, is based on "falsehood and misinformation", telecom industry body COAI said in a letter to regulator Trai. Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) said the proposal of "fair share charge" will put the onus on large global entities, who are profiting from India, but not contributing to its economy or infrastructure development. The industry body, whose members include Jio, Airtel, Vodafone Idea etc, said the people and companies are being misguided by propagating unfounded fears and supposed scenarios by certain entities with vested interests. Meanwhile, calling for signatures of startups, a note from "Save The Internet" campaign members mentioned that the letter meant for submission to Trai is to oppose network usage fees proposed by telecom operators, and against the idea of imposing telecom licensing on online services. The note said that Airtel, Ji

COAI says OTTs paying Fair Share Charge won't violate net neutrality

The principle of net neutrality mandates that all internet providers give its users equitable access to all content and applications on the internet without any discrimination