CITNE faculty member gives talk on '3G in India: Getting it right' at Google, Bangalore
August 3, 2007

Synopsis:
For millions of people in our tier-II cities, tier-III cities and rural areas, 3G (a broadband wireless network capable of carrying voice and data at reasonable rates) will be the only available ramp onto the information superhighway. In contrast with Europe and North America, 3G is not a luxury for India but a necessity. There is still less than one Internet connection per 100 people, and last-mile economics preclude the widespread deployment of traditional "wireline" infrastructure, especially if a viable wireless alternative exists. If such an infrastructure can be speedily deployed, it will have significant positive welfare impacts and the policy makers have a responsibility to ensure that telecom continues to remain India's sunshine infrastructure story.

However, the excitement and activity surrounding the impending 3G spectrum auctions might lead one to imagine that once the spectrum is allocated to the right providers, the information infrastructure will magically emerge. This is not the case. Spectrum is only one part of the mobile commerce ecosystem. Value creation from the spectrum will occur only if the supporting network infrastructure –thousands of base stations and massive backhaul transmission networks – are rolled out rapidly. Also required is the rapid widespread adoption of 3G-capable mobile devices, and the creation of content and applications that can be piped over the infrastructure to the devices. Holdup on any of these layers can slow down and possibly impede the process, since each layer – content, infrastructure, devices – requires the others to create value for end-user consumers and businesses.

Googlers in Bangalore gave an excellent audience to Professor  Bapna as he discussed alternative pricing and allocation mechanisms for the 3G spectrum and a set of related incentives to encourage the rapid infrastructure roll-out to rural India. The audience interaction and their questions made it an intellectually stimulating talk.