Voice&Data TLF focuses on the Future of the Mobile Economy

The TLF was attended by 250+ technology and business decision-makers and policymakers across the communication and broadcasting sectors.

Voice&Data presented the Telecom Leadership Award for 2022 and the V&D Excellence Awards

Voice&Data, India's foremost communication magazine, held its 22nd Telecom Leadership Forum (TLF) on 19 April 2023 at the Shangri-La hotel in New Delhi. Over 250 policymakers, business decision-makers, and technology professionals from telecommunications, start-ups, academia, enterprises, and the influencer ecosystem participated in the one-day conference. The event featured the presentation of the V&D Telecom Leadership Award for 2022 and the V&D Excellence Awards for the year 2022.

Delivering the keynote address, Uma Shanker Pandey, Member (Services) of the Department of Telecom, Government of India, spoke about the immense growth of mobile technology in India and its impact on businesses, employment, and the challenges it faces. He also talked about the steps taken by the government to promote connectivity, security, and job creation while emphasising the rise of mobile commerce and digital payments in India.

AcknowledgingIndia’s challenges in terms of connectivity, especially in rural areas, the Member (Services) pointed out that access to high-speed broadband in India is limited, creating a digital divide. He further informed that the government is taking steps to meet these challenges by launching a project to provide 4G services to 25,000 villages that currently have no network and upgrading 2G/3G networks to 4G. The government is also extending mobile connectivity by adding 2,000+ towers to cover the North-East region, he added.

The TLF, with the theme Future of the Mobile Economy, saw industry veterans such as Bharti Enterprises Vice Chairman Akhil Gupta, Vodafone Idea Chief Regulatory and Corporate Affairs Officer P Balaji, and Reliance Jio and Retail President and Chief Public Policy & Regulatory Officer Ravi Gandhi share insights into the trends in communication and connectivity, including 5G, satellite communications, and enterprise connectivity. The speakers highlighted the importance of increasing average revenue per user (ARPU), collaboration on partnerships to improve the return on capital employed, and sharing infrastructure, particularly in fibre and edge data centers. They also emphasised the need to upskill human skills to create better use cases for driving industry growth.

Other topics discussed at the conference included opportunities for the mobile ecosystem, reinventing business communication, and redefining telcos' enterprise customer experience. The forum also talked about the growth of broadband infrastructure in the 5G Era, the need to transform enterprises with Edge and private 5G, the challenges of creating the infrastructure for 5G, and Aatmanirbhar Bharat 3.0.Speakers also deliberated on satellite-based communication networks, the hype and reality around satcom, the role of the mid-band spectrum in augmenting 5G, and the challenges of creating the infrastructure for 5G.

Several prominent speakers attended the TLF, including Dr R S Sharma, Former Chairman, TRAI and Former CEO, NHA; Dr Kumar Sivarajan, Co-founder and CTO, Tejas Networks; Mayank Bidawatka, Co-Founder, Koo; Dr. RK Upadhyay, CEO, C-DOT; Shivaji Chatterjee, Executive Vice President, Enterprise and Government Business Hughes Communications India; Prateek Pashine, President-Enterprise Business, Reliance Jio; Arun Karna, Managing Director & CEO, AT&T India; Himanshu Gupta, Country Manager - Telecom, Media & Entertainment (CME), HPE; Anil Jain, CEO, NIXI; P Balaji, Chief Regulatory & Corporate Affairs Officer, Vodafone Idea; Pankaj Kitchlu, Systems Engineering Director, Juniper Networks; and Aveek Roy, Vice President of International Sales - IMEA, Sangoma.

The list also includes Dharmender Khajuria, National head, Network Partnership, Airtel; Sheena Joseph, National Head-Customer, Enterprise Business, Vi; Rashim Kapoor, Head Core and Hub CTO, Airtel; Lt. General AK Bhatt (Retd), Director General, ISpA; Tilak Raj Dua, Director General, DIPA; Arvind Bali, CEO, TSSC; Prof NK Goyal, President, CMAI Association of India & Chairman Emeritus, TEMA; Rajat Mukarji, Director-General, BIF; Arpita Paul - Managing Director - Communications, Media & Technology, Accenture India; Aditya Khaitan, Partner, Deloitte India; Jaideep Ghosh, COO, ShardulAmarchandMangaldas& Co; Dr. SN Gupta, Chairman of the Board, Bluetown India & BIMSTEC, South Asia; Umang Das, Chairman, FIIF & Advisor, RANext; and Ashish Garg, Sr Manager – Spectrum & Policy, South Asia & APAC, GSMA

The highlights of the event included the presentation of the Telecom Leadership Awards and the V&D Excellence Award. The Telecom Person of the Awards for 2022 was conferred upon the enablers of Made in India 4G Stack, jointly to TCS, C-DOT, Tejas Networks, and BSNL. The Pathbreaker of the Year was given to Made in India social media platform Koo while the Lifetime Achievement Award was conferred upon former NHA CEO Dr. RS Sharma.

The V&D Excellence Award is an industry recognition based on nomination and through an internal evaluation process of the V&D team. The awardswere presented to 19 companies for their initiatives and excellence in different aspects of business, including processes, infrastructure, networking, customer service, security, skilling, enterprise solutions, and innovation.

The TLF was powered by HPE and PC Solutions, and supported by Gold Partners Juniper Networks and Sangoma, Telecom partner Vodafone Idea Limited, Digital Partner NIXI, Connectivity Partner AT&T Business, Academia Partner Apeejay Education, Research Partner CyberMedia Research, and Media Partner Dataquest. It was also supported by Broadband India Forum, CMAI, Digital Infrastructure Providers Association, Indian Space Association, TEMA, and Telecom Sector Skill Council of India.