Bharti Airtel launches 5G in 8 cities, to cover entire country by March 2024

Bharti Airtel will offer 5G services in eight cities, including Delhi, Varanasi, Mumbai and Bengaluru, chairman Sunil Bharti Mittal said on October 1 as Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched 5G services in the country at the India Mobile Congress in New Delhi.

The company would roll out 5G services in several cities by March 2023 and across India by March 2024, he said.

"Today is an important day for the country since it is the start of a new era. I believe that the start of this era during the 75th anniversary of Azadi ki Amrit Mahotsav will bring in new awareness, new energy and open up a lot of new opportunities for citizens in India," Mittal said.

"We are proud and lucky to have a leader who understands technology in detail. I usually meet several people in the world. While a lot of leaders appreciate technology, understanding it in detail and using it for the country's progress, I don't think anyone can do it like PM Modi."

Mittal said 5G services would spawn several use cases, 1,000 more entrepreneurs and dozens of unicorns— startups valued at $1 billion or more—in the coming years.

Also read: Mukesh Ambani promises 5G across India by December 2023

Airtel made a successful bid of Rs 43,039.63 crore in the recently held 5G spectrum auction in the country that received a record Rs 1.5 lakh crore worth of bids. The telecom major paid Rs 8,312.4 crore, equivalent to four years of dues, upfront in August this year.

In his Independence Day speech, Modi said that the 5G service would offer 10 times faster speed and villages would get access to optical fibre. Internet would reach the remotest part of the country, he said.

Also Read: 'Business as it should be': Sunil Mittal praises DoT as Airtel gets 5G bands within hours

In terms of speed, the thumb rule for 5G is 100 Mbps, though it may vary. The broad consensus for 4G is that it is in the range of 60-70 Mbps.

Apart from high-speed data, 5G also has the potential to enable several enterprise-level solutions such as machine-to-machine communications, connected vehicles, and more immersive augmented reality and metaverse experiences, among others.

Also read:  5G is like a digital Kamdhenu, the heavenly cow that grants whatever we desire, says Mukesh Ambani

In his speech, Mittal applauded Modi for his various ambitious initiatives such as Digital India, Make in India and Startup India. He said that without the Digital India vision, the country would have faced a lot of misfortune during the coronavirus pandemic.

"When PM Modi spoke about Make In India, I confess today that I never believed manufacturing would happen in India in my lifetime, especially in electronics. We import $500-600 billion right now but it has become a reality today that India is on course to become a manufacturing country" Mittal said.