Reliance Industries, Qualcomm Conduct LTE-TDD Trials in India

Reliance Industries Ltd. (RIL) and Qualcomm have started conducting trials for offering broadband services using the long-term evolution time division duplex (LTE-TDD) technology, The Hindu Business Line reports. While RIL conducted trials at the Reliance Corporate Park in Navi Mumbai, Qualcomm demonstrated LTE-TDD mobility in Gurgaon, said the paper. Both have partnered with Swedish equipment maker Ericsson to conduct the trials. In Qualcomm's case, the demonstration live-streamed multiple high-definition video feeds to a mobile van in the Gurgaon area, showing a seamless handover between base stations while maintaining session continuity. The demonstration was carried out using USB dongles based on Qualcomm's multimode chipset that supports both LTE and 3G.

Outlook and Implications

• Boost to LTE in India: Both trials were conducted on the broadband wireless access (BWA) spectrum. RIL holds pan-India BWA spectrum, while Qualcomm has BWA spectrum in four circles of Mumbai, Delhi, Haryana, and Kerala. Mukesh Ambani's RIL had bought Infotel Broadband, the sole winner of pan-India BWA spectrum in an auction concluded in June. Qualcomm acquired the BWA spectrum in the same auction. The trials are a significant step towards commercial deployment of LTE-TDD. While Qualcomm has always been committed to LTE, the move from RIL could dampen the future prospects of WiMAX technology in India. Backers of WiMAX technology had pitched it as a rival to LTE and had hoped to make inroads into the Indian broadband space. With the success of its LTE-TDD trial, RIL now looks set to deploy LTE, instead of WiMAX.

• Qualcomm's Promotion of LTE: Qualcomm is meanwhile seeking to sell its yet-to-start wireless broadband businesses in India. The Economic Times earlier quoted company executives with direct knowledge of the developments as saying Qualcomm had approached leading mobile companies offering a 100% stake in all the four spectrum-holding companies. Qualcomm has required that the buyer of its broadband licences would have to give an undertaking to use the spectrum only to offer services on the LTE technology. Qualcomm, best known for pioneering CDMA technology, has a history of participating in spectrum auctions to popularise and expedite the commercialisation of new technologies. By participating in India's BWA spectrum auction, Qualcomm hoped to help foster the deployment of TD-LTE. Commenting on its plans to exit India, Qualcomm has stated that it will work with 3G operators to develop the 3G+LTE ecosystem, commercially deploy LTE TDD in the BWA spectrum, and then to exit its India LTE venture.

• Early Launch of LTE in India: Although the Indian mobile market is currently still relying on 2G technologies, the country's major operators are actively deploying 3G technologies and could leapfrog some developed-market operators in launching LTE services. Tata DoCoMo, the joint venture of Tata Teleservices and Japan's NTT DoCoMo, has already launched a 3G service, while the likes of Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Essar and Aircel are planning to follow suit by the end of this year or early next year (see India: 22 November 2010: Aircel Announces 3G Launch Plan in Early 2011; India: 25 October 2010: Bharti Airtel to Launch 3G by End-2010 and India: 21 October 2010: Vodafone Essar to Launch 3G in Q1 2011). With RIL and Qualcomm's LTE-TDD trials, commercial LTE services could be available in 2011.