The Sachet Telecom Architecture for Off Grid Locations: An Indian Case Study

In the light of past attempts to provide universal access to telephony and data connectivity, this paper outlines a new telecom architecture tailored to the needs of rural areas, the Sachet Telecom technology. It presents an economic model for an Indian state, Rajasthan, showing the Sachet Telecom architecture, besides empowering local entrepreneurs, scores over the conventional approach in commercial and environmental terms. The approach has the potential to be replicated for rural voice and data connectivity in energy starved regions across the world and can act as a bridge to prepare the population for the coming of fibre networks. DOI: 10.4018/jbdcn.2012040103 42 International Journal of Business Data Communications and Networking, 8(2), 41-51, April-June 2012 Copyright © 2012, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited. five states in terms of rural population, UP, Bihar, West Bengal, Maharashtra, and AP, did not figure in the top five states in terms of the diffusion of rural telecom services. The top performers were the usual suspects: HP, Kerala, Punjab, TN, and Haryana. HP had a penetration rate of 38% and Bihar only 8%. In other words rural diffusion is happening in relatively well off pockets and once these pockets are covered, diffusion is likely to hit a roadblock unless new policy frameworks and business models are conceived. This paper outlines the deficiencies of the conventional telecom architecture in the context of rural, off-grid locations, presents a new architecture, and suggests a policy approach for the USO Administrator given the new architecture and the potential of optic fibre to facilitate the provision of basic services in rural areas. Sections 3 and 4 outline the supply and demand conditions in rural areas, Sections 5 and 6 present the conventional and new architectures, Section 7 presents the business case of the new architecture, and Section 8 concludes with a course of action for the USO. 3. CONDITIONS OF SUPPLY IN THE RURAL HINTERLAND The current GSM architecture (referred to as the ‘conventional’ architecture’) for rural areas is very similar to the GSM architecture used for urban areas, incorporating a central tower covering a cluster of villages1. In rural conditions this comes up against a combination of challenges. High Cost of Network: In urban areas, the operational bottleneck is spectrum as operators must service a large number of subscribers in a small area. In the rural hinterland the bottleneck is network coverage as operators must service a small number of subscribers spread over a large area. Setting up a rural network is costly for a number of reasons. a. Low population density leads to lower addressable market per base transceiver station (BTS). b. Rural towers are more likely to be ground-based than urban towers, due to the scattered population and fewer buildings of sufficient strength supporting roof-top towers. Groundbased towers could cost 50% more than roof-top towers. c. High cost of backhaul: Given the large distances and lower traffic involved, microwave is the medium of choice for back-haul connectivity in rural areas. Due to the high bandwidth requirement and spectrum crunch the Department of Telecommunications, Government of India, is insisting that operators move to a fibre based backhaul at the earliest. This is costly given the initial volume of traffic that is forthcoming. Issues of very high cost of laying fiber, right of way and change of land use also come into the picture. As a result once one moves into the hinterland, away from the main highways (where coverage is subsidized by urban users and freight transporters), the quality drops sharply. Also, the quality is highly variable exhibiting peaks in uninhabited areas where not required and troughs in dwelling and rural habitats where required. Limited Sharing Potential: Due to the low population density of rural India, studies undertaken by organizations like Credit Suisse (2009) and Citibank (2009) have concluded that only one operator can be expected to have marginally profitable operations in a region (this may increase to two in big villages with a population of more than 2000)2. This reduces the potential tenancy ratio of the tower business. Discontinuous Electric Supply: Discontinuous and erratic electricity supply necessitates alternative sources of electricity to keep tower operations running. Inevitably, this 9 more pages are available in the full version of this document, which may be purchased using the "Add to Cart" button on the product's webpage: www.igi-global.com/article/sachet-telecom-architecture-offgrid/70209?camid=4v1 This title is available in InfoSci-Journals, InfoSci-Journal Disciplines Communications and Social Science. Recommend this product to your librarian: www.igi-global.com/e-resources/libraryrecommendation/?id=2