Reliance Jio Gets DoT Nod For Satellite Communication Services With the license, the company can set up and operate the GMPS services in the licensed service areas which is valid upto 20 years

Department of telecommunications (DoT) gave a letter of intent (LoI), on September 12, to Reliance Jio infocomm's Satellite unit to start high-speed broadband-from-space services, as per reports. It is also reported that Jio Satellite Communication Ltd (JSCL) had applied for a global mobile personal communications by satellite services license earlier this year, will shortly be issued a letter of intent by the DoT. This would make JSCL the second company after OneWeb to secure this license to offer broadband services through satellites.

With this license, the company can set up and operate the GMPS services in the licensed service areas. The license is valid for a period of 20 years, from the date of its grant after satisfying stipulated conditions. The GMPCS offers voice and data services through satellite.

Earlier this year, Jio platforms had announced a joint venture with Luxembourg-based SES to provide the satellite-based broadband services in India. Jio Space Tech is developing significant gateway infrastructure in the country and will leverage the medium earth orbit (MEO) and geostationary (GEO) satellite constellations.

Reports said that we will get to see strong competition in the space broadband sector in the upcoming years because many private companies are likely to enter in the market. The companies that are said to intensify the competition in serving the world's second largest telecom market are Jio, Bharti-backed OneWeb, Nelco (Tata group satcom company), Canada's Telesat, Elon Musk's SpaceX and Amazon's Project Kuiper.

As per market studies, the global broadband services market size was valued at $385.5 billion in 2021 and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 9.6 per cent from 2022 to 2030.