According to the Times of India, the Indian government is considering revising licensing conditions to prohibit telecom operators from purchasing network “critical equipment” from Chinese companies. This move will prevent Huawei and ZTE from participating in 5G testing and deployment in India.
According to a person familiar with the matter, officials of the Indian Ministry of Telecommunications have been discussing with security agencies and other relevant departments in the past few weeks whether to ban only critical equipment or all equipment from China.
The person familiar with the matter added: “The Indian government should make a decision as soon as possible because the telecommunications company plans to conduct a 5G spectrum auction from January to March 2021.”
Another official familiar with the matter said that it may be difficult to define “critical equipment” because 5G is different from the previous 2G and 3G. With the continuous development of technology, the boundaries have gradually become blurred.
At the same time, the Indian government is also considering revising licensing conditions to force Indian telecom companies to phase out Chinese equipment in the next few years. However, local operators said that the cost of eliminating Chinese companies’ telecommunications equipment is very high, and it will take at least two to three years.
Experts have also stated that replacing Chinese suppliers with suppliers such as Ericsson, Nokia and even Samsung will increase the deployment cost of telecommunications companies by 15-20%.
According to the report, India has joined the ranks of the United States, emphasizing the security concerns of Huawei and ZTE. It has previously prohibited state-owned operators BSNL and MTNL from purchasing equipment from Huawei and ZTE, but so far has not clearly issued any clear information to private telecom operators. Instructions.
Indian Minister of the Interior, Ajay Kumar Bhalla, stated earlier this month that the government has not yet made a statement about allowing Chinese telecom companies to conduct 5G testing or deployment.
It is reported that in July this year, India announced that it had developed 100% domestically produced 5G, which was developed by Reliance Jio, a subsidiary of India’s richest man Mukesh Ambani. It is expected to be deployed in the field in 2021 and can be supplied globally.
Later, there were reports that 100% of India’s domestically produced 5G, but using Ericsson, Nokia’s technology, Qualcomm and other companies’ chips, the core technology is someone else’s, and India just has an assembly.
In September this year, Sanjay Dhotre, Minister of Electronics and Information Technology of India, stated that the government does not intend to exclude Huawei and ZTE from the 5G network infrastructure contract.
A total ban on the purchase of Huawei and ZTE equipment is a great challenge for the Indian government. Ajay Kumar Bhalla, the Secretariat of the Indian Government, said: It is a big task to change and replace the existing telecommunications network. The Indian government cannot simply ban Chinese telecommunications equipment should find an alternative. The Indian government can make a security system to solve the safety problems of using Chinese telecommunications equipment.
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