Starlink in India: Cost and regulatory regime hold key to success

With Elon Musk’s Starlink entering India in collaboration with the country’s two major telecom and data providers, Jio and Airtel, Indian carriers can finally fulfil promises to expand inflight Wi-Fi services to more aircraft.

“These collaborations (Starlink’s with Jio and Airtel) will accelerate broadband expansion and play a crucial role in enhancing connectivity across industries such as ports, rural enterprises, mining, oilfields, villages, and India’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZs), where satellite technology can deliver substantial value”, says Satellite Industry Association (SIA), welcoming the Indian collaboration with Starlink. The SIA also pegs India's space economy at $44 billion by 2033, with satellite broadband serving as a key enabler, quoting a projection by In-SPACe’s Decadal Vision.

In short, having achieved a whopping 94 crore mobile broadband subscribers and still having 50 crores more to cover its entire population, India is one of the fertile markets for data service providers. Satellite broadband services being a new kid in the block, Starlink finds India an attractive market. But much would depend on the regulatory regime that the government would adopt. Reliance-owned Jio, having established itself as the lead data services provider, had already been in talks with many satellite internet service providers to augment its bouquet of services. Many have approached the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) for services of low-orbit satellites to offer cheaper satellite internet services with an easier regulatory regime.

The link-up with Jio and Airtel and the in-principle approval of the government for their operation gives Starlink an early mover advantage. Several providers offering internet through low-earth satellites, like Motorola’s Iridium, crashed out due to the slow market openings in various countries. India being one of the largest markets for these companies, even a moderate share if of the market adds up substantially to their global revenues.

As of now, both Jio and Airtel may offer the services of Starlink through their vendor networks. Globally, Starlink offers two kinds of services, for personal and business users. For personal users, it offers connections to homes with roaming facilities in over 100 markets across the globe. For business, it offers Local Priority for connecting across the country and Global Priority for connectivity across land and oceans. It also offers high-speed internet on aircraft. They also offer Direct-to-Cell services to areas to “eliminate mobile dead zones across the world”.

This service offering in India will depend on the regulatory regime which the government is yet to formulate. If the regime limits the satellite internet services to remote and hilly areas or for corporate bulk usages of data services, it may not have visibility other than in the aviation sector for the public. Even if there is an offer of Direct-to-Cell services, a call may cost around Rs 20 per minute, industry insiders maintain. The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) is yet to make its recommendations on these for the government to take a final call on the licensing regime of the satellite internet services. With the establishment of satellite gateway stations and teleports in India and a ban on local data transfers, security concerns of satellite services, a global seamless service in the country can still be far away.

But, both Jio and Airtel, as well as Starlink have opened the use of satellite for the fledgling Indian broadband sector. Just as the Ku-band Satellite dish services for TV, these Ka-band broadband services will open up a new spectrum and usage further for high-end broadband markets. The SIA has been lobbying for administrative allocation of spectrum for satellite internet technologies as against the auction route.

The Indian telecom and broadband market has been dependent on the low tariff regime for its growth and the high-cost satellite services cannot compete with the telecom offerings and may end up providing for the high-end users in the aviation sector or corporate sector, depending on the regulatory regime which the government is yet to finalise. But, with the entry of Star Link into India, satellite-based services are going to touch the lives of millions of people in India.

(The writer is a senior journalist who has been writing on the telecom sector since the 1990s and has also worked with industry organizations, like COAI.)