Telecom equipment maker Ericsson said in a report on Tuesday that the number of subscriptions to India’s 5G services, which is likely to start from the end of this year, is expected to reach around 500 million or 39% of all mobile subscribers by 2027. . ,
Noting that 4G was currently the dominant subscription type driving connectivity growth in India, Ericsson in its Mobility Report (June 2022) stated that the commercial launch of 5G networks was planned for the second half of 2022, with advanced Mobile broadband was initially expected. Main use case.
“With the increasing availability and affordability of 5G smartphones, coupled with rapid adoption of smartphones in urban and rural areas, 5G subscriptions in the region are expected to grow rapidly to nearly 50 million by the end of 2023,” it added. 5G will represent 39% of mobile subscriptions with approximately 500 million subscriptions in the region by the end of 2027.
As customers migrate to 5G, 4G subscriptions were projected to drop annually to an estimated 700 million in 2027.
“Total mobile data traffic in the India region is projected to grow by a factor of 4 between 2021 and 2027,” said Thiav Seung Ng, Head of Network Evolution, SEA, Oceania and India, Ericsson. “This is driven by a high growth in the number of smartphone users and an increase in average usage per smartphone,” he said.
Ericsson said the average data traffic per smartphone in the India region is the second highest globally, and is projected to increase from 20GB per month to around 50GB per month in 2027 – a CAGR of 16%.
The company further said that while India presented significant opportunities for growth, there were also challenges for service providers. It reported that ARPU (average revenue per user) for telcos remained low, despite the recent increase in the price of data (the average price for 1GB of mobile data reached $0.68 in 2021). “In addition, India has some of the highest prices for spectrum in the world, which hinders the ability of service providers to invest in infrastructure,” it said.