Airtel to offer fixed-line broadband speeds of up to 100 Mbps

Bharti Airtel has decided to upgrade its fixed-line broadband network to offer maximum speed of up to 100 Mbps, up from its current maximum speed of 16 Mbps. For this, Airtel will use a V-fibre based on Vectorization technology which is being used in many European countries.

Airtel has already started providing high-speed internet in Chennai and soon plans to roll it out in the remaining 87 cities, said Ajay Puri, director of operations. He said this deployment is part of Bharti's "Operation Leap" to upgrade its mobile and fixed telephone networks to provide high-speed broadband.

Following this upgrade, the existing Airtel broadband users will be given an option to upgrade to this technology which would require them to pay a little extra for the device. However, internet will be unlimited for the next three months for the same subscription plan they pay for while opting for the new plan.

Airtel justifies this measure as more and more people are using WiFi networks apart from mobile data. Mentioning the stats, from July 2014-October 2015, the total cellular data usage grew 80 per cent while internet usage on WiFi grew to 164 per cent, says a report from Ericsson Mobility. Moreover, while mobile data such as 2G/3G/4G costs on average Rs0.23/MB, WiFi could cost Rs0.02/MB, says a report from the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India.

Reliance Jio and Vodafone are also focusing a lot on fixed broadband internet recently. For instance, Reliance Jio Infocomm is rolling out fibre-to-home wireline network in select cities through which it plans to offer speeds up to 1GB/sec. Just as Airtel, Reliance Jio has also started sending invitations to consumers living in flats and apartment complexes in Chennai.