Sky-high battle between satellite service providers and telcos for spectrum

Satellite companies are demanding spectrum free or at a nominal administered price as is done in other parts of the world. The move is being vehemently opposed by telcos through the COAI

An annual market that is expected to touch $20 billion in the next few years is at stake. No surprise, then, that a fierce war has broken out over this lucrative high-speed broadband pie between global satellite service providers and domestic telecom majors (telcos).  

Elon Musk’s Starlink is already asking Indian customers to pre-book its broadband offering for $99 (which includes the kit needed to power the service in homes).

Like Musk, Amazon’s Kuiper is putting up thousands of low earth orbit (LEO) satellites around 2,000 km above Earth across the world. These LEOs will also cover India, offering high-speed