Airtel 5G Launch: Bharti Airtel’s 5G service will be available in eight cities from Saturday, its president Sunil Bharti Mittal said at the India Mobile Congress.
With this Bharti Airtel has become the first company to launch 5G service in the country.
Mittal said, “When you (Prime Minister) will launch 5G today. 5G from Airtel will be available in 8 cities- Delhi, Mumbai, Varanasi, Bangalore and other cities.”
He also said that Airtel will launch 5G services in many cities across the country by March 2023 and across India by March 2024.
According to a senior company official, Airtel 5G services will be available at existing 4G rates and new tariffs for 5G will be announced after some time.
The official said that 5G services are also being started in Chennai, Hyderabad and Siliguri.
Bharti Airtel’s Chief Technology Officer Randeep Singh Sekhon said the company’s backend infrastructure is ready.
“We need to install some equipment on the mobile towers for 5G service. We are doing it gradually. Till date, this service will be available in the vicinity of the towers where the equipment has been installed,” Sekhon said.
He said that every day Airtel is adding new cities for 5G services and increasing its penetration in the cities.
“People need to have a 5G phone to use this service, which is being launched today,” Sekhon said.
Bharti Airtel along with Ericsson, Nokia and Samsung placed an order for the 5G Gear soon after the auction ended. The Sunil Mittal-led firm recently acquired 19,867.8 MHz of spectrum in the 900 MHz, 1800 MHz, 2100 MHz, 3300 MHz and 26 GHz bands, boosting its spectrum holding.
Bharti Airtel acquired spectrum worth Rs 43,084 crore in the recently concluded auction.
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