Year ender quote by Sathish Gopalaiah, Deloitte India

The year 2020 has been a year of unprecedented data growth in India, which was accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic. A wireless broadband user in India consumed 11 GB1 data per month as of March 2020, one of the highest in the world. The otherwise stagnant fixed home broadband witnessed high growth on account of work, live, interact activities being conducted from home. Enterprises adopted virtualisation as ‘work from home’ became the norm for businesses.

Considering the recent trends powered by increasing broadband penetration, exponential data uptake, the Government’s focus on digitalisation and increasing technology adoption across industries, India may be on the cusp of a data (digital) revolution which has the potential to boost industrial productivity and transform the socio-economic fabric of the country. This also builds the case for an accelerated 5G roll-out and growth in the country.

5G, with its superior features, channelised through enhanced Mobile Broadband, Ultra-Reliable and Low-Latency Communications, and Massive Machine Type Communications capabilities, has the capabilities to revolutionise the customer experience and enterprise landscape both in terms of new revenue growth opportunities (new markets, new use cases) and improved profitability (productivity boost through digital and automation). The potential impact runs across all the key sectors: manufacturing (digital manufacturing use cases such as robotics, IoT enabled automation), media and entertainment (immersive experiences), healthcare (remote diagnosis, monitoring, remotely operated robotic surgeries), automobile (vehicle-to-everything communication), retail (in-store analytics, beacon and heat mapping technology), agriculture (soil and crop monitoring, precision farming), etc.

There are a plethora of relevant use cases for 5G going mainstream in the year to come, but few key challenges such as Right of Way (RoW) and lack of uniform policy framework, limited giga-backhauling to meet future requirements, industry crippling under debt margin pressure constrained on capital expenditure, would need to be overcome for realising it.
CT Bureau