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SatCom Vision Paper -2020

BIF recommendations for Satellite policy in India

January 2015, New Delhi

BIF Documents Confidential & Privileged 12 January, 2015 Page | 2

Executive Summary

This paper focusses on Satellite Communication Industry in India, current regulation policy, new satellite technologies that are now available, new applications and needs from existing and new users and how the Government’s “Digital India “program could be accelerated using satellite technology, and provide unique features and solutions that can accelerate the penetration of broadband technology to the remote, rural & far flung areas of the country. According to recent market reports by Northern Sky Research (NSR), the global broadband penetration scene would change over the decade with the number of subscriptions touted to increase rapidly as our day-to-day life applications turn heavily data centric, as seen in Figure 1.

In the backdrop of all this, is the compelling need for the government to enable and facilitate this process by bringing about changes in the existing policy, and also changes in the way the policies are implemented. This white paper summarizes the Indian landscape for satellite communication based services and provides recommendations for the Indian government to facilitate new policy making to ease the implementation of new satellite reforms and liberalization business prospects in this industry.

Enterprise VSAT 53%

Broadband Access 47%

Broadband Satellite Market Sites & Subs, 2013

Enterprise VSAT 30%

Broadband Access

70%

Broadband Satellite Market Sites & Subs, 2023

Figure 1 Global Broadband Satellite Market Evolution 2013-2023 (Source: NSR, 2014)


Contents

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ............................................................................................................................................................. 2

PREFACE ................................................................................................................................................................................... 4

BACKGROUND .......................................................................................................................................................................... 5

SATELLITE COMMUNICATION INDUSTRY IN INDIA ................................................................................................................... 6

REGULATION/POLICY-LAST POLICY MADE IN 1997. .................................................................................................................. 8

NEW TECHNOLOGIES IN SATCOM ........................................................................................................................................... 10

SATELLITE BACKHAULING FOR 3G AND 4G NETWORKS .......................................................................................................... 13

DIGITAL INDIA AND SATELLITE COMMUNICATION ................................................................................................................. 15

CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS: ............................................................................................................................ 16


Preface Ever since coming to power in mid-2014, the new government led by Shri Narendra Modi has strongly emphasized the national objective of streamlining regulatory governance to facilitate economic development. The Indian economy has been buoyant due to the reforms initiated by this new government to boost industrial growth and woo foreign investors. The recent guidelines from the PMO asking all the ministries of the Union government to use tools and data products based on space industry enabled satellite service technologies to improve administrative and service delivery performance across ministries is a step in that direction. It shows the emphasis and importance given by the present government to promote satellite communications, and its application towards more efficient functioning of the government, making it an essential technology instead of a secondary technology of choice. Hence the relevance of this white paper cannot be underscored more, as the government itself wants to be one of the biggest users of satellite technology, and therefore it must do all it can to liberalize the sector allowing free interplay of market forces for unleashing the power inherent in satellite communication.


Background

The National Broadband Plan & Policy has always provided a prominent place for wireline and GSM based wireless technologies. Unfortunately, satellite technology and its relevance for the expanded penetration of broadband in rural, remote and far-flung areas for connecting the “unconnected“has always been neglected or never given its rightful due. It is a well-known fact that fiber laying is very time consuming and expensive. Even microwave connectivity is very time consuming due to the needs of deploying physical infrastructure viz. towers, and due to acute spectrum crunch in traditional spectrum bands Mobile broadband solutions are equally important to meet national broadband targets of providing “broadband everywhere and anywhere“. Hence it is not only important to provide broadband solutions to rural homes and Gram Panchayats (GPs), but to provide ubiquitous broadband solutions even while “on-the-move. “ Mobile broadband solutions are abundant in urban India, but the real challenge will be to provide the same level of connectivity for rural & semi-urban India. The trend globally, as predicted by NSR in its recent report (Figure 2) shows the high capacity requirements needed to meet rural broadband connectivity demand. Given the vastness of India and variations in terrain, satellite communications provide the fastest way for pan-India deployment when compared to terrestrial alternatives for mobility and connectivity viz. trains, flights, and buses.

With the Indian economy expected to perform well in terms of revenue growth for the next 10 years; the ease of market entry for satellite service providers in this sector will remain a key challenge for the government to reap benefits of satellite based communications. Thus, government backing of the industry in the form of policies to promote private participation in this sector should be elevated to an issue of primary importance.

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2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023

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Global Broadband Access Subscribers by Geography

Rural / Remote Sub-urban Urban

Figure 2 Global Broadband Access Subscribers by Geography (Source: NSR, 2014)


Satellite Communication Industry in India

Figure 3 Satcom Landscape in India

The SSOs

Since the current satellite communication policy in 1997, ISRO became both the direct supplier of bandwidth for DTH and VSAT operators as well as the sole decider along with ANTRIX when and from which foreign satellite operator will the DTH and VSAT operators be able to gain access to satellite transponder capacity. Once an ISP (Internet Service Provider) or DTH provider seeks additional capacity, it approaches ISRO and its commercial arm, ANTRIX in order to provide such capacity. But other than for C band broadcasting services, the ISP and DTH providers are compelled to channel their request to ISRO and ANTRIX, and can only contract with a foreign SSO to provide extra capacity whenever ISRO cannot provide service with its existing constellation during the contract period. This approach has led to a huge shortage of satellite capacity and has slowed the introduction of new broadband IP services to India, and especially to the rural areas. Only in C band broadcasting, can the DTH provider can approach the foreign SSO directly with minimal coordination with ISRO. Some of the foreign SSOs operating via ANTRIX RFPs are: Thaicom, Asiasat, Measat, Intelsat, SES, Inmarsat, etc. The typical time for a VSAT operator to receive approval for a request for foreign satellite bandwidth takes as much as 3 years and then is subject to data rate limitations, and tightly regulated antenna specifications. The recent report released by CAG in July 2014 called “CAG Audit report on Management Satellite Capacity for DTH Service Presented”, indicates that in 2007 -2012 ISRO provided only 22% of its planned capacity to DTH operators. The rest was supplied by foreign satellite operators. Providing anyhow the DTH and VSAT operators are so much depended in foreign satellite operators the question which rises is why not liberalizing the satellite communication policy and increasing competition and price decrease. The current policy causes artificial transponders scarcity which hike the rates unnecessarily.


The VSAT Service Providers

As per a recent NSR report, the VSAT market in 2013 reached revenues of the order of $4.8 Billion globally in equipment and services. The Indian market as of the end of 2013 was at more than 200,000 VSATs of which about 3/4ths are narrowband (less than 128 kbps). These are mainly serving ATMs and form an important element of the larger banking initiatives sweeping the country driven by the PMO. The rest are broadband VSATs for various enterprise applications ranging from cellular backhaul for the North East to island connectivity for the likes of Lakshadweep and Andaman & Nicobar. The main players in the Indian VSAT market are Hughes, Tatanet, Bharti, HCL and BSNL among others. The VSAT providers are usually bundling their projects with satellite capacity deals which increase significantly the sales revenues. The Broadband market is divided into four parts –

Capacity for rural mobile backhauling,

Capacity for enterprise applications in non-fiber and microwave places (such as for remote ATMs),

Capacity for rural e government application such as e education, e health, etc.

Capacity for consumer connectivity. The main mobile operators are using satellite based broadband connections to backhaul their base stations in sub urban and rural places where neither fiber nor microwave technology is deployed. The whole capacity for e-government rural application is supplied by ISRO INSAT systems. Due to the high cost C band and Ku band, the consumer market is quite limited. Enterprises like banks for ATM are one of the major consumers in rural places. The C band and Ku band prices range between 2,800 – 3,500 USD per MHz per month. The Ka band, which is yet to be regulated in India for instance, is priced at less than 1,000 USD per MHz per month, and this results in capacity pricing even below 500 USD per Mbps per month!

The Primary VSAT Equipment Vendors

The main VSAT equipment vendors in the Indian market are Hughes, Gilat, Comtech and Viasat.

The DTH Service Providers

The main DTH providers are Dish TV, Tata Sky, DD, Sun Direct, Bharti Telemedia, and Reliance. The DTH providers provide offer linear services and non-linear services such as VOD. The non-linear services are provided by external landline or external broadband connections. Since C band capacity is almost exhausted, lots of additional Ku band transponders are required where and as demonstrated in the recent “Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India on Management of Satellite Capacity for DTH Service by Department of Space” which determined that ISRO cannot meet the current backlog of demand with its existing constellation of satellites nor with its currently planned future programs. ISRO and ANTRIX have periodically, but in no formally coordinated manner floated


RFPs from time-to-time for the leasing of capacity from foreign satellite system operators. There is a window of opportunity to both address the current domestic satellite capacity shortfalls, and the ensure the industrial policies that have worked well to create a robust domestic satellite industry, by creating new and innovative collaboration polices between ISRO/Antrix and the international satellite operator community.

The Regulator and Policy Maker

India satellite policy is divided among several ministries:

1. The DOS (Department of Space) – Satcom guidelines 2. The DOT (Department of Telecommunication) – Satellite service provider policy plus 3. The MIB (Ministry of Information and Broadcasting) – broadcasting policy and landing stations

up-linking policy. 4. The MHA (Ministry of Home Affairs) – security guidelines

Other entities involved:

5. TRAI (Telecom Regulator Authority of India) – Regulates and provides consultation paper on Satellite policy

6. Wireless Planning Committee (WPC) – coordination on frequency allocation 7. Telecommunication Engineering Center (TEC) – communications equipment performance

standards 8. ISRO (India Space Research Agency) – Developing, launching and operating the INSAT satellites

constellation. Additionally, ISRO coordinates the orbital slots with foreign satellites. 9. ANTRIX Corporation PV LTD – the commercial arm of ISRO which floats the RFP for leasing

capacity from foreign satellites as per India policy since 1997.

Since the Indian Satellite communication policy is spread across so many stakeholders, slow decision-making is an inevitable result. In addition, unnecessary bureaucratic challenges, delays and inherent conflicts of interests between commercial industry requirements and the control over satellite transponder capacity that the government has entrusted to ISRO/Antrix. Further regulatory and policy maker challenges are created when all the oversight functions of the Chairman Space Commission, the ex-officio Secretary to the Department of Space, the Chairman of Antrix, and the Chairman of ISRO are all embodied in one person.

Regulation/Policy – The Current Policy was released in 1997

National treatment

The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), the primary space agency of the Indian government, and Antrix Corporation Limited, the commercial wing of ISRO, plays the role of “middlemen” in the


provision of satellite services in India. ISRO operates the Indian National Satellite System (“INSAT”), as well as the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) and the Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV), which are used for launching satellites into polar and geostationary orbits respectively. Antrix, is a wholly owned Government of India Company under the administrative control of DOS. Antrix was chartered as a private limited company in 1992. Antrix is the exclusive marketing agent for ISRO for the sale of satellite capacity and technical consultancy services and licensing of ISRO technologies. In addition, Antrix offers transponder-leasing services for C-band VSAT services using any foreign satellites. Regulations in India effectively require that VSAT operators route their connectivity through ISRO. India has a domestic industrial policy that advocates for the use of domestic Indian satellite capacity which will be accorded preferential treatment over foreign satellite capacity whenever possible. Examples include:

- Media applications in C-band using a foreign satellite are authorized, but unlike Indian operators, foreign satellite operators must first seek clearance for these offerings, and the end user must obtain a Wireless Operation License from the Ministry of Communications & IT (WPC license).

- The general terms and conditions for up-linking a channel (distribution) and/or for using satellite capacity for contribution/satellite news gathering purposes require a WPC license, in addition to an uplink license (news and non-news). Effectively, the procedure prevents a foreign satellite operator from providing occasional use capacity (C- and/or Ku-band) to end users in India as a minimum of two weeks are required for the end user to obtain a temporary uplink license and another two to three weeks to obtain a WPC license.

- For Ku-band services, end users in India are only allowed to uplink through Indian satellites. No foreign satellite operator is allowed to provide any Ku-band capacity to an end user in India unless it does so via Antrix, an entity with which foreign satellite operators are in direct competition.

Restrictions on the use of foreign satellite capacity for Direct-to-Home (“DTH”) services.

India’s Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (“MIB”) has established guidelines that establish a preference for Indian satellites to provide capacity for delivery of Direct-to-Home (DTH) subscription television services. These guidelines allow for the use of foreign satellites subject to official international frequency coordination with ISRO/Antrix. However, authorized DTH licensees have often been constrained from contracting with foreign operators even when the capacity is being procured through Antrix. In cases where ISRO cannot meet the DTH capacity requirement, the foreign satellite capacity must be procured through Antrix, a direct competitor, creating a unnecessary middleman burdens on these transactions. This scenario with the following effects:

(i) Additional costs are created for the consumer through markups by Antrix; (ii) Antrix is able to structure contracts with the goal (sometimes explicitly stated) of moving the service to one of ISRO’s satellites once capacity is available;


(iii) Antrix determines the rate at which the market grows.

De-facto Monopoly due to a Pyramid Structure

Indian regulations restrict the provision of satellite services by foreign satellite operators directly to end users in the country. A true “open skies” policy should be adopted for the provision of satellite services in India, without preferences for the Indian government’s space agency or commercial arm. Local users in India should be allowed to contract directly with any satellite operator for any satellite capacity that has the ability to serve India, and not be constrained by regulatory policies that establish a “preference” for a domestic operator or service provider, or that constrain the use of the satellite capacity in the country. The fact that the same person functions as Chairman Space Commission and ex-officio Secretary to Department of Space and Chairman of Antrix and also as Chairman, ISRO results in inherent conflicts between the industry needs to the ISRO – ANTRIX – DOS needs.

Market Access

The Guidelines for Uplinking from India require media content providers that down-link programs from a satellite into the country to establish a registered office in India or designate a local agent. India cites oversight of programming content as its rationale for such a requirement, but it could instead control content through its licensed entities such as cable companies or DTH providers. The policy is overly burdensome and effectively requires companies to establish a taxable presence in India. India limits foreign direct and indirect investment in companies engaged in uplinking to satellites to a maximum of 49 percent, negatively impacting the ability of foreign companies to invest.

Security Concerns

TRAI had recommended in 2008 to review the satellite policy and to reconsider open skies policy for foreign satellites. Nevertheless, TRAI’s initiative was rejected by the DOT and DOS ministries who brought up security reasons to continue adopting the archaic 1997 Satcom policy. While supporting the argument that India security measures should not be compromised, BIF believes that there could be set of measures that a foreign satellite operator will have to take to qualify in order to provide service in India which shall enable VSAT and DTH providers to contact directly the foreign satellite operators. In addition, security restrictions on mobile satellite services (MSS) operators were added to the policy, which has restricted the introduction of such high-value services in India.

New Technologies in Satcom

Ka band Frequencies (~20 GHz and ~30 GHz)

Ka-band is the next frequency band that the satellite industry is currently moving to as the availability of spectrum at C-band and Ku-band diminishes and nears saturation. Ka-band is expected to transform satellite communications, in much the same way that Ku-band completely changed the original C-band industry some two decades ago. Ka-band will trigger a similar step-change in the satellite


communications industry, but the impact will be much bigger, presenting challenges for some existing operators. Ka-band is the logical addition to Ku-band services and will evolve as the delivery mechanism for emerging consumer broadband markets that only require “best efforts” connectivity for high-demand consumer services. One of the biggest impacts of Ka-band on ground terminals is antenna size. The equivalent of a 1.8m diameter antenna at Ku-band need be only 1m or less at Ka-band. The comparison with C-band antenna sizes is even more significant. Given the higher satellite EIRP and G/T levels of the Ka-band beams, reliable, high capacity Ka-band services are available from antennas with diameters of only 80-100cm compared to 2.4 – 3.0m antennas needed at C-band. This is excellent news for system suppliers, network operators and terminal installers. Logistics and cost savings when installing a terminal with an 80-100cm antenna compared with a 1.8m antenna (or larger) are obvious, driving down the overall cost of network deployments. The nature of the mobility market depends upon stabilized terminal antennas that instantaneously track the satellite as the vehicle moves. The use of small, 80-100cm antennas, phased-array solution or cost effective metamaterial solution in such communications-on the-move (COTM) applications, be they on a ground vehicle, ship, aircraft or an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV), significantly eases the challenges. As stated elsewhere, the integration of adaptive coding and modulation (ACM) using DVB-S2 and other advanced modem techniques, such as seamless hand off between spot beams, provides the customer with a choice of advanced, compatible terminals available from a range of manufacturers today.

Figure 4 Comparison of C, Ku, Ka band characteristics

Ka band satellite systems have already been deployed in many regions of the world that have all types of weather challenges. The use of multiple spot beams enabling massive frequency reuse has enabled


what are termed “high throughout satellites (HTS) architecture. These HTS systems have already been deployed in the USA, Europe and EMEA. Numerous additional HTS systems are presently under development at both Ka and Ku bands. In India Hughes has proposed launching a massive Ka band HTS satellite to deliver broadband ISP services. ISRO is also developing its own Ka band system for tentative launch in 2018. Whilst tropical climates are challenging for both Ku- and Ka-band, there are proven solutions through advancements in ground technology that have enabled the deployment of high availability systems.

Figure 2 – List of planned and launched Ka band satellites

Indicative List of Planned and Launched Commercial Satellites with Ka-band


Introduction of NGSO to India

NGSO (Non Geo Satellite Orbit) enables the introduction of LEO and MEO constellation into India commercial market. The main famous constellations of LEO satellites globally are Iridium and Globalstar. These constellations provide MSS services (Mobile Satellite Services). There are a several future LEO constellation proponents including such companies as LeoSat, Facebook, SpaceX, and Google that are currently investigating the potential for NGSO constellations. The Facebook and Google proposals are reported to be primarily for low cost FSS Internet access applications. The most famous MEO constellation is O3B that provides trunking connectivity for core network trunking and mobile backhaul services featuring low-latency and lower bandwidth cost comparing to GEO Ka-band constellation. NGSO regulation is coordinated globally by the ITU. Currently NGSO has no regulatory framework in India. Global regulations were initiated when Teledesic, a NGSO FSS operator in the late 90s, approached ITU-R and several other countries to promote its plan of deploying 288 LEO satellites. Despite the fact that these satellites were never launched, the regulation of the NGSO Fixed Satellite Services (FSS) has been adopted in many countries. The decision related to NGSO FSS that were taken in the ITU – R WRC-97 Resolutions 130 and 538. Based on this regulation, O3B launched their MEO constellation with the primary market application being mobile backhauling. BIF recommends the adoption of globally conforming regulations covering the usage of NGSO in India and to let the VSAT service providers as well as the cellular operators choose which constellation to use-whether GSO or NGSO one.

Satellite Backhauling for 3G and 4G Networks The main applications of the Indian VSAT industry are the banking industry (ATMs), Oil & Gas, and government application for rural places. However, with the global trend of expanding premium services like 3G networks and 4G networks into sub-urban and rural locations, connectivity to base stations in these locations will become very vital. There are three main bandwidth requirements of 3G and 4G base stations:

1. 3G base station in rural place – 10 Mbps downlink (D) and uplink (U) of 2 Mbps 2. 3G aggregation of several base stations in rural places – 20 – 30 Mbps in total D + U 3. 4G base station in rural place – 100 Mbps D + 20 Mbps U

BIF predicts that in the coming 2 – 3 years the first case of 3G with 10 Mbps D and 2 Mbps U will be the most common application. In places where neither fiber nor Microwave technology is cost effective, the only cost effective solution will be satellite. With current C band and Ku band bandwidth costs the cellular operators will pay between 400,000 USD to 500,000 USD per base station annually which kills


the business case for rural locations. However if the Ka band is regulated as well as permission is granted for NGSO constellation and “free the market for open competition“, this could lead to a sharp drop to up to or even below 50,000 USD per base station annually! Additional important factor would be the latency. As 3G and 4G application becomes more and more sensitive to latency, GSO might be too slow with latency of 500ms. The cellular operators globally define the user experience as one of the most important parameter for returning customers! Imagine yourself browsing in a web page which comes up every 10 seconds in compared to web page which comes up within 3 - 4 seconds. The latency contributes a lot to this experience. The introduction of NGSO will enable mobile operators to provide their customer better user experience.

Cellular Base Station Caching

Another trend that becomes more common is base stations caching. As part of the user experience improvement, there are several global cellular vendors such as NSN, Huawei and Samsung which declared their base stations solution for 4G base stations. These solutions are caching data such as videos, maps and huge amount of web pages based on caching algorithm. The caching enables to reduce the backhauling capacity by up to 35% and the overall TCO by up to 15%. However the main advantage is the huge improvement in user experience where web page which was loaded in few seconds could be loaded almost immediately due to caching in base station. It enables all kind of services, especially 3D services which were capacity consuming before and were congesting the backhauling to be practically deployed once the information is cached at base station level. However, even the caching solution for base stations requires thick and expensive backhauling architecture which will apply to rural India. BIF predicts that the future to deploy advanced networks like 4G networks in rural India will require extensive backhauling which might not be justified by low ARPU. However, future solutions based on Data Multicasting via satellite might provide the solution. BIF recommends the Satellite Data multicasting backhauling. Researches shows that majority of bandwidth is occupied by video (YouTube, Netflix, Sports, Bollywood movies, e-learning, etc.) and audio. If these content will be off loaded from the main backhauling pipeline, 4G networks and 3G networks will be capable of being deployed with very lean backhauling links either based on un licensed bands or low cost MW/MM links. Since the caching engine can predict quite well in rural places (up to 40% and more) the amount of Videos/Audio to be consumed, these data can be multicast to the caching base station. In multicasting environment, the satellite becomes the most efficient solution as it can cover huge areas. For instance a beam of 400 Mbps can be sold in annual rate 2.5-4 M USD in Ka band. However in coverage area of diameter of 1,500 km to 700 km if there are 10,000 base stations, the cost per link drops down to 250-400 USD per base station per annum! Therefore BIF recommends the following:

1. Regulation of Data multicasting via satellites 2. USOF to review and enhance the role of providing subsidy to also include satellite operators

who will provide backhaul for 3G/4G networks in rural India


DIGITAL INDIA and Satellite Communication “Digital India“ program – the 20 Bn USD flagship program of the Government of India to digitally empower the entire 1.3 Bn population of this country and ensure digital delivery of all government. services including socio-economic development programmes besides micro-banking ( mobile ) and other specific rural-centric applications. The success of this program will be measured by:

a) Deployment time across pan-India b) Coverage-both for fixed as well as for mobile applications

Satellite technology can provide the most efficient solution for both the challenges:

a) Deployment time: Satellite technology can be deployed the fastest as compared to Fiber & MW. To accelerate the implementation of the “ Digital India “ program, Satellite Communication technology can be used to temporarily address all the requirements till the Optical Fiber network of NOFN is fully deployed . Later, the investment in Satcom shall stay protected as it can be used for deployment of critical services.

b) Broadband–on-the-move for rural India

Rural India commutes for a significant portion of their active time through trains and buses. This time is required to be usefully utilised to:

(i) Connect to the Internet (ii) Avail e-government services (iii) Avail of useful market related information viz. e-mandi (iv) Do online purchases from e-commerce sites (v) Use for receipt of online content for e-education etc

Broadband connectivity on the move cannot be provided either by Fibre or Microwave. Only Satellite Communication can provide it. New Satellite technologies viz. Ka band, NGSO satellite, Data Multicasting of Content etc can be very cost-effective for providing solutions for e-governance, e-education, e-health besides mobile banking and access to e-commerce sites to rural & remote subscribers.


Conclusions and Recommendations

a. “Single Window“ clearance – for issue of all approvals/licenses etc.

b. Open up the Indian satellite space to participation by International satellite operators

with in-built, fail-safe safety and security measures.

c. Separation of the Licensor, Regulator and Operator functions in the satellite space domain to conform to the best International practices of free markets. This means review of the roles of “Department of Space”, ISRO and Antrix to ensure that it does not create any “conflicts of interest “ resulting in delay, opportunity costs and actual financial losses including damage to the national objective of connecting the unconnected.

d. Regulating Mobile Satellite Services (MSS) as part of VSAT license.

e. Transparent & easily understood security criteria to be laid down for compliance.

f. Regulation/Opening of Ku-BSS and Ka-band.

g. Regulation of use of NGSO.

h. Permission for Data multicasting via satellites

i. Time-bound award of approvals/licenses – maximum 6 months

j. Deploying satellite communication solution as part of DIGITAL INDIA program in order to deploy PAN India the fastest and in order to connect the public transportation commuters.

BIF acknowledges and thanks all of the contributors to this white paper with special mention to Vern Fotheringham, GVF, NSR, Avi Gutgold, Debashish Bhattacharya for their support in developing this Vision document.


Kymeta is developing antenna subsystems for terminal integrators and manufacturers to build into next generation satellite communications terminals for fixed and mobile applications. Using metamaterials-based technology, Kymeta’s solutions dynamically steer a beam towards the satellite with no moving parts, and maintain that connection whether it is the satellite that is moving, the platform, or both. Kymeta’s antenna subsystems will enable the production of affordable satellite terminal products that are flat, lightweight and efficient, for maritime, aeronautics, automobile markets and wherever mobility is key.