A significant amount of communication signals are sent back and forth across communication networks today as it has become commonplace to use a mobile phone, tablet, or personal computer to access information available all over the world and use different contents. And now with the launch of 5G, we are looking forward to innovations across IoT, automation, and Industry 4.0.
Testing and Measurement of these upcoming solutions has become increasingly crucial. Anritsu is enabling these innovations by providing products and services for the development, manufacturing, and maintenance of a range of communication systems.
ELE Times had the opportunity to interact with Madhukar Tripathi, Associate Director -Marketing & Optical Business, Anritsu India. He talked about the Anritsu Telecom Symposium, trends and challenges in the 5G product development space, the company’s key focus areas, and upcoming opportunities.
ELETimes: Tell us about Anritsu and Anritsu Telecom Symposium.
Madhukar Tripathi: Anritsu Corporation is a global provider of innovative communications test and measurement solutions for 120 years. Anritsu’s “2020 VISION” philosophy engages customers as true partners to help develop wireless, optical, microwave/RF, and digital instruments, as well as operation support systems for R&D, manufacturing, installation, and maintenance applications. Anritsu also provides precision microwave/ RF components, optical devices, and high-speed electrical devices for communication products and systems. The company develops advanced solutions for 5G, M2M, and IoT as well as other emerging and legacy wireline and wireless communication markets. With offices throughout the world, Anritsu has approximately 4,000 employees in over 90 countries.
Every year we at Anritsu, organize Telecom Technology Day or Anritsu Telecom Symposium to introduce our new test solution methods to our customers in India. This year we organized Anritsu Telecom Symposium at Radisson Blu Hotel Kaushambi on 30th Nov 2022. This Telecom Symposium was inaugurated by Mr. Sushil Kumar DDG, IoT, TEC New Delhi. Anritsu Telecom Symposium was attended by many customers from various industry segments such as Test Labs, Telecom R&D, Manufacturing Companies, Chipset R&D, Regulatory, etc. We had eminent speakers from Anritsu UK and Anritsu Corp Japan. Ms. Sanna Brandt from Anritsu UK talked about Anritsu ORAN test solutions while Mr. Inoue from Anritsu Japan covered the IoT Testing perspective.
Dr. R Lenin Raja, Senior Member – IEEE, IEEE – EMC Society., Senior Member – IEEE-Product Safety Engineering Society; Principal Consultant – EMC Test & Training Center Pvt Ltd., talked about TEC standards and test methodologies for Base Stations, and Namita Crystle from the Anritsu India Marketing team talked about IoT and Anritsu Test Solutions.
ELETimes: How do you see telecom market in India?
Madhukar Tripathi: The government of India is monitoring 5G deployment and working closely with telecom eco-system partners. Recently government also conducted meeting with CEOs of telecom companies to boost telecom production, design-led R&D, etc.
Indian Telecom minister announced BSNL will roll out a 4G network that will be upgraded to 5G soon while Airtel and Jio have already started rolling out 5G networks in many cities. BSNL is to be allotted Rs 62,000-crore spectrum for its 5G rollout as per DoT.
Further, iPhone manufacturer in India- Foxconn announced an infusion of $500 million into its India unit. Indian Telecommunication Bill, 2022 is under draft which will be paving the path for telecom ecosystem growth further.
Telecom is now a pillar for many services and 5G deployment is India is creating many opportunities for growth. By 2025, India will need ~22 million skilled workers in 5G-centric technologies such as the Internet of Things (IoT), Artificial Intelligence (AI), robotics, and cloud computing according to IBEF.
A report by Deloitte India and CII projects that 5G will boost monthly average data use per subscriber to 45.61 GB by 2027.
Keeping an eye on the future and matching global telecom developments, the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has developed a sixth-generation (6G) innovation group, to drive the development of 6G technology.
All this information & updates indicates Indian telecom industry is on a growth path and coming years have a bright future.
ELETimes: What is the current expansion plan for Anritsu India?
Madhukar Tripathi: Indian telecom market is growing fast, and the industry is focusing on the growth of the telecom ecosystem partners from R&D to production to maintenance. Anritsu is globally known for its telecom test and measurement solutions and works closely with many chipsets R&D, and telecom production companies. We are committed to expanding our operation in India. Anritsu India is working as Anritsu’s global R&D center for many of our products and services. We are increasing headcount and recruiting in sales, and services- technical support, repair, and calibration along with the R&D team.
ELETimes: What is being displayed at Anritsu Telecom Symposium and how this is relevant to the Indian market.?
Madhukar Tripathi: We have displayed key products for R&D and production testing using four demo stations. These solutions cover the R&D and telecom production testing need of Indian customers.
Demo station 1 had Radio Communication Test Station MT8000A. MT800A is our flagship 5G test solution. This is all in RF, Protocol, and Application Test solutions for 5G UE and Chipset. This is used by R&D and manufacturing companies. MT8000A All-in-One 5G RF Measurements and Protocol Tests for FR1 and FR2. MT8000A with suitable add-ons such as MA8161A is used for Simple OTA environment for mmWave protocol tests while MA8171A Integrated RF/Protocol test and measurement OTA environment for beam management, etc. MA8172A is used for the 3GPP-compliant Compact Antenna Test Range (CATR) method for mmWave R&D and Conformance tests.
Demo Station 2 has a 5G Base Station Test set up using 5G Base station testing MS2850A+MG3710E. This test setup enables Efficient and Accurate Evaluation of 5G Base Stations and UE RF Characteristics.
Demo Station 3 had production line testing solution Universal Wireless Test Set model MT8870-02A. MT8870A supports Complex Testing and Evaluation of Smartphones and Tablets Supporting 5G NR and Other Wireless Communications Standards. Below are two key advantages of Universal Wireless Test Set MT8870A.
- Low-cost, high-speed measurement for production lines with futureproof expandability
- Supports various wireless communications standards in addition to 5G NR Sub-6 GHz
Demo Station 4 had Bluetooth & WLAN 6E testing solution using MT8852B & MT8862A test set up. MT8862A is Wireless Connectivity Test Set and MT8852B is Bluetooth Test Set. The Wireless Connectivity Test Set MT8862A supports an RF performance measurement environment under realistic operation conditions (Network Mode). Connections are supported in the IEEE802.11a/b/g/n/ac/ax, 2x2MIMO AP, and STA modes. Additionally, supporting securities, WEP, WPA Personal, and WPA2-Personal, make measuring various devices connect in the Network Mode.
ELETimes: What is the Wi-Fi market outlook for India?
Madhukar Tripathi: Internet access has created a significant impact on social & economic aspects worldwide. Wi-Fi has emerged as an economic technology to access the internet.
The government of India is pushing Digital India, Gati Shakti, Broadband for all, Smart Cities, etc projects to enable better citizen life. These projects are creating a significant impact on the social and economic life of citizens and enabling easy access to government schemes. Many railway stations and other public-importance places are equipped with Wi-Fi under various schemes. Hybrid work culture post-COVID-19 is contributing to Wi-Fi growth in the Indian market. Smart Home and many consumer goods are now Wi-Fi enabled. This is contributing to Wi-Fi growth too.
The government’s PLI scheme/ Make in India is enabling cost effective Wi-Fi Access Point manufacturing. We have seen demand for the 6GHz band for Wi-Fi in India. Wi-Fi 6 is starting to get traction in the consumer segment as well. However, the gateway router market is still dominated by Wi-Fi 5 shipments. Due to all these factors, Wi-Fi market is growing fast in India.
