Coronavirus outbreak could delay 5G deployment in India

Coronavirus outbreak could offset the production of 5G equipment, which in turn could delay the deployment of 5G technology globally, including in India.

5G deployment could be delayed in India. (REUTERS)

Coronavirus outbreak has put a number of things on hold. For starters, Foxconn has shut down its production plants in China temporarily, which could lead to delay in the availability of Apple's upcoming budget iPhones. Apart from this, the pandemic has also cast a shadow on the fate of the Mobile World Congress 2020 that is scheduled to take place later this month. Now, a new report says that the deployment of 5G in India could be delayed due to the recent outbreak.

According to a report by the Economic Times, Coronavirus outbreak could offset the production of 5G equipment, which in turn could delay the deployment of 5G technology globally, including in India.

The Indian government is planning to auction 5G waves along with the 4G waves in India around the first quarter of 2021. The Telecom ministry plans to auction 8,300 MHz of airwaves of which 6,050 MHz will be used for 5G services. The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) plans to offer the 8,300 MHz at a reserve price of ₹5.23 trillion.

Now, experts believe that if the Coronavirus issue continues for a new more months, the Indian government could find it difficult to auction 5G waves in the country. The pandemic is expected to delay the deployment of 5G network and have an impact on the availability of devices. This coupled with exorbitantly high prices of the 5G spectrum could "reduce the business case" for debt-ridden telecom companies

"The continuing coronavirus outbreak in China would further delay 5G (services) in India as production of 5G network equipment at Huawei may be hit," Nitin Soni, Director (Corporates), Fitch told the publication.