India’s LTE Could Soon Be On FDD Track When India initially allocated spectrum in the 2300 MHz bands, it meant that the country would need to adopt Time Division Duplex (TDD) version of the Long Term Evolution (LTE) technology. However, the recent 1800 MHz spectrum auction might have changed the game much. With the recent auction, the India telecommunication market might have made its first move in the direction of Frequency Division Duplex (FDD). A number of telecom operators now have 1800 MHz spectrum and it would be fair to assume that they would not be using that for 2G network since data is where the growth is going to come from. Many in the industry believe that going forward FDD is likely to be the dominant version in the Indian telecom market. A key reason for this belief is that 700 MHz spectrum auction is also on the anvil. Besides, 800 MHz auction too might happen this year itself. Both these spectrum bands are likely to drive the adoption of FDD more than TDD in the India market. “The Indian service providers have already decided in favor of FDD. Going forward, this will be the dominant version of LTE in the domestic market,” a well-placed senior source said on condition of anonymity. This is further corroborated by the recently released report by Care Research. “Their decision to shift towards FDD LTE in 1800 MHz will help 4G to grow in India as it is the most widely used LTE band globally with 44 percent of the total launches in that band and will have the largest ecosystem very soon,” says report. The industry is likely to face fewer ecosystem issues in FDD than in TDD since the global market is moving towards this version. A big challenge for the Indian 4G service providers was the device ecosystem. This would be considerably reduced with a movement towards FDD. The number of FDD devices in 1800 MHz was 483 while only 207 TDD devices were commercially available at the end of January 2014, according to Global Mobile Supplier’s Association. However, the road to FDD adoption is not going to be without challenges. “Though TD-LTE is picking up gradually, Indian players would find it difficult to source devices operating across these two different technologies. The biggest challenge for Indian players willing to launch 4G in both these bands would be cross-functional ecosystem across these bands,” says the report released by Care Research. Besides the voice challenge exists for both TDD and FDD versions. However, Voice Over LTE (VoLTE) could be more viable in FDD than TDD version. Spectrum in 2300 MHz, auctioned in 2010 in India, is not suitable for carrying voice being in the higher frequency band and would be used primarily for data purpose. With the recently won spectrum in the 1800 MHz, operators would be able to effectively launch VoLTE if required. In spite all the efforts to launch VoLTE, CSFB seems to be the technology of choice for the time being, says the Care Research report.
Posted on: Wed, 26 Nov 2014 07:58:54 +0000
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