TRAI norms for VSAT services soon

NEW DELHI, AUG 19: The government has sought Telecom Regulatory Authority of India's (TRAI) recommendations on issues concerning Very Smal...

NEW DELHI, AUG 19: The government has sought Telecom Regulatory Authority of India’s (TRAI) recommendations on issues concerning Very Small Aperture Terminal (VSAT) services for fixing level of entry fee, percentage of revenue share as licence fee and other aspects of licence conditions.

The licence period for new licences has been made 20years, extendable by additional period of 10 years thereafter, Verma said adding that these licences would be issued on non-exclusive basis.

Licencees would have to pay a one-time entry fee and a licence fee based on revenue share, Verma said adding that TRAI’s recommendations on these issues would be based on the comments by industry as well as subscribers. The comments can be given till September 7 on the consultation paper.

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So far the government had provided 14 licences with specified licence fee structure for operating 5,905 VSATs through out the country. All 14 licences, of which four have been terminated, were issued on of first come first served basis without going through any tendering procedure and without putting any limitation on the number of licences.

Satellite based gateways for data traffic have beenrmitted, as also hiring of transponder capacity from foreign satellites in consultation with Department of Space, Verma said. This recognised the fact that VSAT based services would play a significant role towards the goal of affordable, efficient and world class telecom infrastructure in the country, he added.

Verma said the VSAT services could prove to be a useful solution to supplement bandwidth availability and thereby help avoid the current bandwidth shortage problem. "As data traffic increases over the years, such alternative solutions may become even more important. The efforts to develop VSAT services need to be seen in this context," TRAI chairman said in the consultation paper.

One of the proposed 17 issues to be considered by TRAI included that whether the market for VSAT services was attractive enough to justify the levy of an entry fee and the basis for determining entry fee for new entrants.