NEW DELHI: State-owned Telecom Consultants India Limited (TCIL<\/a>) and the UK-based satellite broadband<\/a> services company Methera<\/a> have entered into a three-year alliance for the deployment of earth stations and bring devices to the market.
\"We have signed the memorandum of understanding with Methera to build ground stations in India in India and outside,\" Rajiv Gupta, chairman, TCIL told ETTelecom and added that the initiative would bring an impact on country's broadband landscape starting 2022.
India's telecom and engineering arm has entered into a three-year contract with the British satellite services provider which, according to the top executive has also offered the state-run company an option to manufacture compatible handsets in the country.
Methera is planning a satellite constellation launch in 2022-23 with the availability of the first tranche of capacity to selected priority partners.
The development has come on the close heels of Sunil Mittal-driven Bharti Airtel<\/a>'s partnership with OneWeb<\/a> to commercially launch the satellite broadband services by mid-2022, and is currently in discussions with the Indian Space Research Organisation.
Mittal recently told ET that OneWeb's broadband services would not conflict with Bharti Airtel's mobile services, and would serve remote areas such as desert and hilly regions, which remained unconnected but has demand for connectivity services.
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