India’s young population continuously demands natively smart infrastructure to cater to high data consumption and better living. In the era following the pandemic, there has been a significant increase in the demand for data. Here are some stats:

• 19.5GB per capita data usage (highest in the world), India is the second-largest market for telecom 
• 136% Expected growth in average data usage at 46GB per user per month in 2027 
• 20% On-year data growth reported in major service providers post-5G deployment 
• 80% of mobile data is being consumed indoors and is expected to increase ~95%

The demand for digitally enabled, reconfigurable, and spacious homes has also risen significantly post-pandemic. A large part of data consumption happens inside buildings – homes, offices, commercial buildings, etc. Upcoming advancements such as 5G, 6G, AI, IoT, etc. have the potential to offer superior connectivity and services to end-users. 

Importance of an agile and robust connectivity infrastructure inside buildings

Significant leaps in job opportunities and economic growth are on the horizon with the provision of agile, high-volume access connectivity within indoor environments. This underscores the critical importance of establishing a quality and robust telecom connectivity infrastructure within buildings.

Efforts to streamline and facilitate the compulsory installation of neutral and shared telecom infrastructure, including cables, optical fibres, and ducts, as an integral component of in-building solutions, are imperative. This infrastructure should be accessible to all, ensuring equitable connectivity for everyone.

Role of Common Telecom Infrastructure (CTI)

Common digital infrastructure inside building connectivity is paramount in fostering seamless and reliable communication networks within urban environments. Optical fibre cables, fibre amplifiers, power units for active/passive telecom infrastructure, digital distribution frames, and other related components are referred to in this context. Here are the key roles it plays:

• Enhanced connectivity: Common digital infrastructure facilitates ubiquitous connectivity within buildings, ensuring that occupants have access to high-speed internet, voice services, and other digital communication tools.
• Cost efficiency: The cost of installing and maintaining individual communication networks for each occupant is significantly reduced by providing shared infrastructure such as optical fibre cables and ducts. This promotes cost efficiency and affordability for both building owners and users.
• Scalability and flexibility: Common digital infrastructure allows for scalability and flexibility in accommodating the evolving communication needs of occupants. It enables easy upgrades and modifications to support new technologies and services without the need for extensive rewiring or infrastructure overhaul.
• Promoting competition: By mandating neutral infrastructure accessible to multiple service providers, common digital infrastructure encourages healthy competition among telecom operators. This competition can lead to better services, improved pricing, and increased innovation in the digital communication sector.
• Supporting Smart Building Solutions: Common digital infrastructure lays the groundwork for implementing smart building solutions such as IoT devices, sensors, and automation systems. These technologies rely on robust connectivity for energy management, security, and environmental monitoring functions.
• Enabling digital transformation: In an increasingly digitised world, common digital infrastructure inside buildings is essential for digital transformation across various industries. It facilitates adopting cloud services, remote working, digital collaboration tools, and other innovative technologies that drive efficiency and productivity.
• Community connectivity: Common digital infrastructure fosters community connectivity by providing shared access to digital resources and services within buildings. This promotes social interaction, collaboration, and knowledge sharing among occupants, contributing to a vibrant and connected community environment.
• Energy efficiency: Optimises power usage, leading to energy savings and reduced environmental impact

By implementing CTI, a systematic deployment and layout can be achieved, which will make it easier to identify and rectify faults. This will ultimately reduce the costs incurred by consumers in terms of both time and money. However, there are many challenges in implementing this:

• Sub-optimal Quality of Service (QoS) inside buildings
• Lack of provisions in existing buildings for implementation of mandatory, well-defined quality and standardised CTI
• Difficulty in accessing and installing telecommunications facilities inside the buildings, due to commercial interests
• High price point for Service providers for access to premises
• Absence of fire safety features in fibre cabling infrastructure deployed inside the buildings

Legacy Fibre (G.652.D) is more susceptible to bend loss. There is a need for bend-insensitive fibre inside buildings like G.652.A2 that can reduce losses at higher wavelengths for a future-proof network.

This is the time for India to take steps in this direction and build an ecosystem of in-building connectivity infrastructure. 

STL Estelan offers end-to-end high performance, advanced cabling infrastructure, provides enhanced lifecycle, high scalability and flexibility