Be that as it may. In the past 5 years, the structure of the Indian telecommunications industry and in particular the mobile segment has seen a big change. Looking back to 2015, prior to the entry of Reliance Jio, the Telecommunications Service Providers were showing signs of being stretched for finances, and investment in continuing to build out their networks with newer technologies such as 4G, to be able to keep pace with the potential demands. 2G bloodbath had sucked in investable finances in canceled licenses. Discussions were already happening around mergers and acquisitions. This had a knock-on effect on offering the Indian consumer a true mobile broadband experience, a step-change in offerings to a large mobile customer base, but something that 3G failed to achieve, thereby the industry lost the opportunity to capitalise on that with a potential to increase ARPU. There was anticipation that 2016 was going to witness the beginning of mega consolidation in the Indian telecom sector. To unsettle an already ailing sector, Reliance Jio came into the market with a 4G mobile broadband offering and a mandate to scoop up as many customers as possible in a short space of time, due largely because of strong regulatory tailwinds, especially low spectrum charge, free trials, etc.

The Threat of New Entrants, one of the forces in Porter\u2019s Five Forces industry analysis framework, refers to the threat that new competitors pose to current players within an industry. The Threat of New Entrants exerts a significant influence on the ability of current companies to generate a profit. When new competitors enter into an industry offering the same products or services, the other companies competitive position will be at risk. There are barriers to entry such as brand loyalty, Cost advantages, Government regulations, Capital requirement, etc. In the case of Reliance Jio most of these barriers to entry did not seem to have an impact for obvious reasons.

To combat the competition triggered by Reliance Jio, the consolidations in the telecom sector should have led to the pooling of vital resources and infrastructure, which one hoped would have led to better service quality and customer experience for consumers and a justification to increase ARPU in certain segments of the consumer base, alas not. Therefore, I see the industry divided into 3 strata \u2013 established operators (Airtel, Vodafone-Idea), weak players (BSNL\/MTNL), and a challenger (Jio ). The challenger has redefined the technological and strategic landscape of the telecom sector.

The impact of Reliance Jio\u2019s entry has not only changed the competitive landscape but there have been other negatives effects too. As always, the losers are those in rural India. I believe the urban-rural divide has increased and the mantra of Digital India has fallen by the wayside. With the industry in turmoil, the contributions to the Universal Service Obligation Fund are on the way down, the crippling blow by the hangover from the AGR controversy is unlikely to see the USOF benefitting. To my mind the Supreme Court Judgement is bad in law by declaring the industry as wilful defaulters, forcing industry to pay for the flawed judicial system. Does anyone see the private companies benefitting the common man as opposed to worrying about how to get back their profits? Can the government-backed Service Providers step in when you look at their own financial woes? The government-backed service providers are in a COMA. Growth in rural teledensity has been stagnated in comparison to urban teledensity.

Telecommunications technology will continue to develop and we are starting to hear about the emergence of 5G, which to my mind is delivering bandwidth with internet connectivity 24 X 7. 5G is a different ball game, no cousin of 4G. Regulation permitted, 5G has the potential to see new, disruptive players entering the market in smart cities, IoT devices, and private networks. 5G will be a game of internet-connected devices for a plethora of service offerings. All these new players will also require a spectrum, driving innovation in regulation and allocation. We may need to look at regulating bands of spectrums to be available through shared and priority Access, and to be dedicated to enterprise applications. Telcos will need to evolve to open cloud networks, network sharing, network slicing and new spectrum to attain the cost structures, agility, and innovation to compete in 5G bandwidth delivery either via wireless or fiber. Only the most astute, who choose technology will succeed. Fair, stable regulation and policy will be the differentiator.

Learning from past mistakes, Indian Telcos should start to think about charging a fair premium for 5G services, not to enter into internecine wars. The fixed broadband world has offered speed-based pricing for some time and 5G enhanced mobile broadband does offer considerable improvements in network speeds and capacity. It is time to start to prepare the Indian consumer to pay more for the best connectivity. This will be especially true of operators looking to offer converged mobile broadband, and fixed wireless and or fiber access connectivity in a 5G age.

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