After the successful auction of the 5G spectrum, the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has initiated moves to auction the backhaul spectrum.

DoT has asked the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) to provide recommendations for the auction of the E-band and V-band spectrum, which is utilized for backhaul purposes.

DoT was deliberating on implementing the ethos of the Supreme Court’s 2012 decision on the universal auction of spectrum for almost a decade, it had been provisionally allotting backhaul spectrum to operators in the interim.

With the auction of the backhaul spectrum, certain operators will not only have to procure future backhaul spectrum through auctions but will also have to re-acquire the spectrum that they had been provisionally assigned, through the auction.

Backhaul spectrum allows telcos to send data back from users and access cell towers to aggregators, essentially consolidating the network, The Hindu reported.

There are various means of backhaul including optic fiber, satellites and wireless backhaul through the spectrum. With poor fiberisation of telecom towers, telcos are heavily reliant on the spectrum for backhaul purposes.

With the 5G rollout, data requirements of users and enterprises will increase exponentially and the demand for backhaul spectrum from operators will also increase massively.

Many experts believe that the current fiberisation of cell towers, which is at 30 percent, will not be able to uphold a data-rich 5G network.