The deal, known as the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) in official terms, also includes mobile number portability across each other’s territories. 

The agreement states: “Each party shall ensure that a service supplier of the other party is accorded access to and use of any public telecommunications network or service, including leased circuits, offered in its territory or across its borders on a timely basis and on reasonable, transparent and non-discriminatory terms and conditions.”

While UK-based Vodafone once operated extensively in India through 100 owned subsidiaries before merging with Idea Cellular, no Indian telecom operator has ventured into the UK telecom market so far. This India-UK FTA may reverse that trend and provide Indian companies with the regulatory certainty necessary to pursue UK-based opportunities.

The agreement also deals with factors like allotment of spectrum and interconnection rights to transborder service providers. It states, “Each party retains the right to establish and apply spectrum and frequency management policies which may affect the number of suppliers of public telecommunications networks or services, provided that it does so in a manner that is consistent with this agreement. Each party also retains the right to allocate frequency bands taking into account current and future needs and spectrum availability”

In addition, it permits radio frequency allocations through transparent processes. These allocations are intended to encourage public interest and propel a fair competition for players from both countries. 

The India-UK FTA talks of allowing major operators to allow non-discriminatory access to their resources to operators from other markets the same way they would allow their subsidiaries.

The text stipulates: “Each party shall ensure that a major supplier in its territory accords suppliers of public telecommunications networks or services of the other party treatment no less favourable than major supplier accords in like circumstances to itself, its subsidiaries, its affiliates, or any non-affiliated supplier of public telecommunications networks or services regarding,” ensuring parity in operational access.

The partnership will allow Airtel to gradually move to a commercially live, full-scale 5G Standalone network, offering the advanced capabilities of 5G to their consumers.

Randeep Sekhon, CTO, Bharti Airtel, says: “Ericsson’s enduring partnership with Airtel has entered an exciting new phase, marked by the deployment of Ericsson’s 5G Core solutions to support Airtel’s transition to 5G Standalone. This rollout will play a pivotal role in Airtel’s long-term 5G strategy, boosting network capacity and enabling the delivery of innovative, differentiated services to customers.”

Andres Vicente, Head of Market Area Southeast Asia, Oceania and India, Ericsson, says: “As a global 5G leader, Ericsson is committed to providing Bharti Airtel its latest technology solutions. This deployment is a significant step towards making Bharti Airtel’s network 5G Standalone ready and future proof. Ericsson’s dual-mode 5G core enables monetization through network slicing-based services and network API exposure, unleashing new, innovative use cases for consumers and enterprises.” 

As part of this arrangement, Ericsson will install its Signalling Controller solution across Bharti Airtel’s network. Furthermore, Ericsson’s 5G Standalone Charging and Policy solution will be presented. These new capabilities are a strategic boost to Bharti Airtel’s 5G monetisation initiatives, allowing for the development of new business models.

Ericsson has been a long-term connectivity partner of Bharti Airtel for over 25 years, encompassing every generation of mobile communications, including the award of Bharti Airtel’s first 5G contract in India.

“We will issue recommendations on Net neutrality tomorrow,” Trai Chairman RS Sharma told reporters on the sidelines of an open house discussion on in-flight connectivity (IFC) for providing phone call and data service.

The recommendations on IFC will be issued within 10 days, he said.

Supporters of Net neutrality back the principle that the entire Internet traffic should be available to everyone on equal terms without any discrimination based on business considerations of service providers.

The Trai’s recommendations will come at a time when there is a debate raging over Net neutrality?globally.

The US regulator, Federal Communications Commission, has said recently that it plans to roll back the?”Net neutrality” rules the were adopted in America in 2015.

When asked about status of consultation on over-the-top (OTT) service providers offering calls and messaging service using Internet like whatsapp, skype and viber, Sharma said that the recommendations on Net neutrality should be able to provide some of the answers to issues around OTT players and VoIP (Voice over Internet protocol) calls.

OTT refers to applications and services which are accessible over the Internet. They ride on operator networks offering Internet access services such as social networks, search engines and video aggregation sites.

Here is your 10-point cheat-sheet to this big story:

• Net neutrality calls for all websites and content on the Internet to be treated equally – that means no content should be easier or cheaper to access than others.
• TRAI’s recommendations come at a time when there is a global debate over net neutrality. In America, the main regulator, the Federal Communications Commission or FCC, says it plans to repeal landmark 2015 rules that banned Internet providers from slowing down access to or charging more for some content.
• TRAI has said that Internet service providers should not enter into agreements which lead to any content getting preferential treatment.
• TRAI’s recommendations acknowledged the role various public consultations and inputs from various stakeholders played in formulating the recommendations, which will now be presented to the government’s Department of Telecommunications (DoT).
• “‘Discriminatory treatment’ shall include any form of discrimination, restriction or interference in the treatment of content, including practices like blocking, degrading, slowing down or granting preferential speeds or treatment to any content,” TRAI said.
• TRAI recommends that the license terms of the ISPs should be modified to include these terms as part of the conditions under which they are allowed to offer Internet services.
• Those who champion net neutrality say that differential pricing would put small content providers and startups at a disadvantage. They also say that any service provider or platform allowed to offer some content as cheaper or faster is conferred with dangerous amounts of power in gate-keeping.
• TRAI has moved to prevent big Internet service providers from unlimited power in deciding
• what Web content customers can get and at what price.
  TRAI said that “implementation of any order of a court or direction issued by the Government, in accordance with law” would take precedence over any of its net neutrality related recommendations.
• TRAI also notes that “DoT may establish a multi-stakeholder body with framework for collaborative mechanism” for “monitoring and enforcement” of net neutrality recommendations.