NEW DELHI: Internet giant Google's mission is to get a billion Indians hooked to broadband, and make each use 10GB a month in the next 4-to-5 years, says Gulzar Azad, Country Head (Connectivity) at Google India. In an interaction with ET's Danish Khan, Azad, however, says contributions would need to come from across the internet space, telcos, content players and the government to realise this goal. Edited excerpts.
What's Google's ultimate goal in India from a connectivity perspective ?
We would want a billion people online, and want them on broadband. And, that's really where India's full potential would be fulfilled. It's clear that `digital' is an economic growth force and that's something India not only needs to move towards, but also track over a period of time in terms of achieving it in a given time-scale. Google's ultimate goal is a billion broadband users, each using 10GB a month. And to do that, contributions have to come from the internet world, telcos, content players and the government.
How soon can we reach 10GB per user per month in India?
The data revolution has taken some time to emerge in India. But it can't be more exciting, with consolidation happening, transformation happening and how data is being thought about at the operators' end along with the government's vision. We would like to achieve 10GB/user/month in the next 4-to-5 years.
Google recently got its first `station deal' in Pune. Are more in the offing ?
In the last one year, we started with Railways WiFi and completed 110 stations by end of the year. Usage levels and traction we are seeing from users, government and industry is exciting. Which is why, we announced plans to create a product platform, Google Station, to enable reliable, fast and secure WiFi by ISPs, venues and establishments.
We are looking at more partnerships around the Google Station platform. A specific initiative is partnerships with system integrators. Larsen & Toubro (L&T) is one we are in discussions with. Interactions are also on with ISPs. Some will translate into partnerships.
What's your take on the current state of WiFi in India?
Consumption and demand for public WiFi is emerging, which establishes that it is complimentary to 4G and 3G networks. 4G and public WiFi need to co-exist to fulfill India's data vision.
A foundation layer of public WiFi is fiber layouts. The government is thinking about it both at the central and state levels. But more needs to be done. One stack is done and on top of it more and more public WIFi should come up. There are some headwinds on how the regulator is thinking about it. There's a lot of opportunity and potential once the regulation comes in.
There are 115 stations live in India. The goal is to get to 400 stations with high speed networks jointly created by RailTel and Google. With 6 million users a month, there's potential for much more. We are focused on ensuring monetisation kicks in this year.
Business models have existed, so the question really is timing. Over 150 TBs of data is transacted a day. Once the network scales up, mobile WiFi offloads will be in place. If the new norm is 3-to-5 GB/user/month, the key issue is how wireless spectrum can optimally support that. Industry average revenue per user (ARPU) must rise but the cost of supporting this has to go down.
Do you see telcos catalysing WiFi ?
Telcos are increasingly realising it, amid high data usage. By announcing plans with WiFi usage (bundled in), telcos are playing catalyst.
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