Airtel and Cisco to build largest IP-based 5G network in India

American multinational tech leader Cisco has announced that it will develop India’s biggest IP-based, fully automated, 5G-ready network in partnership with Airtel, India’s largest telco services provider.

The collaboration will enable Airtel subscribers to benefit from world-class mobile network speeds and enhance the customer experience.

Cisco noted in its press release that India, with 1.1bn subscribers, represents the world’s second-largest mobile communications market, and that the monthly data usage average is projected to increase from 3.5GB in 2017 to 17.2GB in 2022.

"As part of Project Leap, Airtel has built a world-class network that is ready to serve the explosive growth in high speed data services in a market with over one billion subscribers," said Randeep Sekhon, CTO at Bharti Airtel, in Cisco’s press release.

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"Partnering with Cisco will help us transform our network architecture to enhance customer experiences while concurrently preparing for 5G and the era of connected things."

Jonathan Davidson, SVP and GM of Cisco’s Service Provider Business, added: 

"Cisco and Airtel share a vision for simplification through automation, and are working closely to define mobile networking best practices that will support its growth plans." 

"With today's announcement, Airtel is marking key milestones in its network architecture transition to prepare the company for greater reach and scale and deliver quality services to mobile users in India- no matter their location."