Telecom regulator News

Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) on Friday set phone call ring time at 30 seconds on mobiles and 60 seconds for landline phones, in case the call is neither answered nor rejected by the subscriber.

Trai also plans to phase out IUC by January 1, 2020.

Telecom regulator Trai on Wednesday said it is expected to issue recommendations on the controversial issue of net neutrality in about a month.

In the last auction, held in October 2016, the government managed to sell only 964.80 MHz of spectrum in various bands as against 2,354.55 MHz of radiowaves on the block.

The public wi-fi hotspots are proposed to be set up on the lines of yesteryear's PCOs that were used for making phone calls by public on paid basis.

Telecom operators Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea Cellular have questioned regulator Trai's timing of recent paper on refining mobile network test rules, calling it a 'disguise' after the damage was done by Reliance Jio.

Telecom regulator Trai has asked telecom operators to launch at least one mobile Internet data pack that has higher validity of one year.

Telecom regulator Trai expects to start the consultation process for the next round of spectrum auction in about a fortnight.

The revenue of telecom sector from consumer services like mobile telephony and data dipped 10.5 per cent to Rs. 37,284 crore in the October-December period over the previous three months, according to regulator Trai.

Regulator TRAI on Tuesday stressed the need to identify bottlenecks that make the functioning of telecom business difficult in India and listed out processes such as licence acquisition, spectrum allotment and mergers that can be reviewed.

Telecom regulator TRAI on Thursday recommended small entrepreneurs and shop owners be allowed to become Wi-Fi hotspot venues and team up with 'aggregators' to offer low-cost public Internet services in a PCO-type model.

Telecom regulator TRAI will review the rules of tariff assessment with regard to promotional offers and predatory pricing, issues that have triggered a public spat between Reliance Jio and incumbent operators.

Telecom watchdog Trai today said it will look into the proposed Vodafone and Idea merger "as and when" regulatory issues crop up.

In order to assess call drop and other network issues of various telecom operators, telecom regulator Trai will start with drive tests in January. The drive will also include the latest entrant Reliance Jio.

Telecom regulator Trai on Wednesday said demonetisation has accelerated digital transactions in the country, but expressed concern over India trailing nations like Singapore and Malaysia at the level of broadband connectivity, a key component of digital infrastructure.

In its guidelines, Trai said that as third party entities like websites and applications are non-licensed entities and are appointed by telecom service providers, operators are responsible for ensuring compliance of regulatory norms.

Telecom regulator Trai on Friday recommended a total penalty of Rs 3,050 crore on incumbent players Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea Cellular for denying interconnection facility to newcomer Reliance Jio Infocomm.

Telecom regulator Trai will hold a session this month with industry experts to examine concerns over unsolicited online video ads that download automatically without consumers' knowledge, pushing up their data costs inadvertently.

Trai had called a meeting with telecom operators to resolve the ongoing dispute involving Jio and incumbent telecom operators such as Airtel, Vodafone and Idea over inter-connecting points.

Sector regulator Trai on Firday met telecom operators Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea to discuss ongoing tussle over network interconnection, but barred officials of industry body COAI from the meeting.