Deriving Value from Technology

Connectivity and mobility have become firmly entrenched in our lives, and their power to shape them seems almost limitless. No longer handicapped by spectrum shortage, India is all set to embrace 5G technology in tandem with the rest of the world.

Communication service providers are working on their respective strategic roadmaps for network evolution to the 5G-technology standard and IOT-enabled devices. 5G need not be an overlay network. It is being pre-released in stages via two iterations of the 4G network – LTE-Advanced and LTE-Advanced Pro. Investment is being planned in radio access network including MIMO-adaptive antennas, packet core, and mobile transport solutions. Limited deployment and 5G trials are expected to start by mid-2018 while commercial availability is slated for 2020.

The potential opportunities that 5G, IoT, and M2M bring to the industry are immense. The challenge is to build the required ecosystem in totality. Without design, development, and fabrication in place, the local value addition will be minimal, which will take away the price advantages of manufacturing.

5G technology promises to enable dramatic improvements in peak data speeds, network latency, and agility. This combination raises a host of possibilities, such as remote healthcare, virtual reality, augmented reality, connected vehicles, full automation of homes and businesses, thus laying the foundation for smarter cities and rural communities. Identifying new revenue-generating opportunities, it allows operators to support a growing number of customers and potentially billions of connected IoT devices with consistent quality of service.

The Indian enterprise is now ready to embrace digitization. Technology convergence is expected to transform a lot of business aspects. Artificial intelligence, machine learning, and smart things have reached a critical tipping point that will increasingly augment and extend virtually every technology-enabled service and application, promising an intelligent future.

As continuous innovation shapes the way enterprises derive value from technology, India Inc. prepares to face the challenges which implementation of GST shall bring. With it is an underlying optimism that the enactment of GST shall build investor confidence, establishing the country’s credentials as a safe haven investment destination!