Satellite spectrum will ensure mobile connectivity in remotest parts: Sunil Bharti Mittal

Sunil Bharti Mittal, the founder and chairman of Bharti Enterprises, on Wednesday said customers will soon be able to carry their mobile phones to the remotest part of the world, with them in the skies and blue oceans.

These remarks come hours after his telecom giant Bharti Airtel signed a deal with Elon Musk’s SpaceX to bring Starlink’s high-speed internet services to its customers in India. The agreement enables Airtel and SpaceX to explore how Starlink can complement and expand Airtel’s offerings, and how Airtel’s expertise in the Indian market complements SpaceX’s direct offerings to consumers and businesses.

“For the telecom industry, the addition of satellite technology should be no different from bringing new technologies to its customers. Just like 4G, 5G, and 6G in the future, we will now have one more technology in our mix, i.e. SAT-G,” Mittal said in a statement, adding a new era of seamless global connectivity beckons.

These comments come nearly five months after Union telecom minister Jyotiraditya Scindia stated that satellite spectrum allocation will be done administratively. Airtel and billionaire Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Jio had last year demanded auction of sitcom spectrum. Starlink and SpaceX founder Elon Musk had lauded the Indian government’s move to allocate satellite spectrum administratively.

In his statement, Bharti said he has no doubt the satellite and the telecom industry globally will respond to his call to combine their strengths.

“In my opening remark at the recently concluded Mobile World Congress 2025 in Barcelona, I made a call to both the telecom and satellite players to work together, combine their strengths, and complete the mission of connecting the unconnected, covering the oceans and the skies as well as difficult-to-reach areas. I am glad that this is being followed through with active announcements of partnerships between satellite companies and telecom operators,” said Bharti.

“I had made a similar appeal in my keynote address at the Mobile World Congress in 2017 for operators to slash roaming charges, which were preventing customers from carrying their home networks and seeking local SIMs or Wi-Fi hotspots. The industry responded favourably; roaming rates went south, and the international home network switch-on rates shot up. Today, roaming tariffs across the globe are affordable,” he said.

Earlier on Wednesday, Reliance Jio also signed a deal with Elon Musk's SpaceX to bring Starlink's internet services to its customers in India. The deal will enable Jio and SpaceX to explore how Starlink can extend Jio’s offerings and how Jio can complement SpaceX’s direct offerings to consumers and businesses.  Jio will make Starlink solutions available through its retail outlets as well as through its online storefronts. “Jio will not only offer Starlink equipment in its retail outlets but will establish a mechanism to support customer service installation and activation,” the company said.