The Hindu Business Line : Mobile phone calls within buildings account for 60%

According to estimates made by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), about 60 per cent of all mobile phone calls are actually originating or terminating when the subscribers are indoors within buildings such as offices, homes or hotels. While the statistics will make the dwindling fixed line operators see some hope, TRAI has suggested to the Government that mobile operators should be asked to deploy technologies that can make spectrum utilisation within buildings more efficient so that more radio frequencies can be freed up for outdoor cellular use.

TRAI has said that operators should deploy fixed-mobile convergence technologies that would allow a GSM mobile user to shift to another technology such as Wi-Fi that uses a different frequency band while he is in a building. By using this technology, operators will be able to free up scarce GSM spectrum for outdoor mobile usage. At present, all mobile users are dedicated an entire channel of GSM frequency band every time a subscriber makes a call, irrespective of whether he is indoors or outdoors.

According to TRAI, this is not the best way to achieve efficient spectrum utilisation. “Various technological solutions such as fixed-mobile convergence, low power equipment that consume less airwaves, and also reserving a part of the spectrum only for in-building coverage will enhance the efficiency of utilisation of the spectrum. These solutions for in-building coverage are already being deployed in some countries such as the UK and Switzerland,” said a TRAI official.

The Ministry of Communications had sought TRAI’s views on ways to tide over the existing spectrum crunch being faced by the operators. TRAI said that even as the Government makes available additional spectrum, operators should also deploy various technological means such as synthesised frequency hopping, multi-layer network architecture, smart antennas, and advanced coding for better utilisation of the given spectrum.

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