India: TRAI proposes 20-year wholesale satellite broadband licences

James Calloway

TRAI has recommended 20-year satellite communication network licences, renewable for up to another 20 years, to bring wholesale satellite broadband capacity under India’s Telecom Act, 2023.

India’s Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has proposed a new authorisation for a “satellite communication network (SCN),” operating under India’s Telecom Act, 2023. The proposal, reported on November 9, 2026, also recommends assignment of spectrum to entities holding that authorisation.

The document sets a regulatory route rather than granting an operating licence: it names no licence holder, allocated frequencies, coverage target or launch date.

Under the proposed structure, SCN entities supply capacity to telcos and do not serve consumers directly. OneWeb can therefore fit the model. Starlink’s standard model sells satellite broadband directly to consumers, so that model would fall outside the proposed authorisation without a different route to market.

The distinction is commercial, not technical. The recommendation allows SCN providers to offer “network as a service” (SCNaaS) to eligible service providers. That gives a wholesale operator or telecom a way to buy capacity, while the service provider retains the customer relationship.

Three companies are waiting to use the route, and the source describes all three as enthusiastic about starting satellite broadband in India:

• Eutelsat OneWeb, backed by Sunil Bharti.
• Reliance Jio, linked to Mukesh Ambani.
• Starlink, Elon Musk’s satellite broadband business.

Security clearance forms the first step for each applicant. Once an individual company clears that process, it can seek spectrum assignment based on TRAI’s recommendations. The process does not let one applicant’s clearance stand in for another’s.

Local reports say OneWeb and Jio are likely to receive approval ahead of SpaceX’s Starlink. The cited reasons are security concerns and Musk’s recent outbursts on X aimed at Ambani. That ordering remains a media assessment; the TRAI recommendation does not announce a clearance sequence or approval date.

TRAI’s recommendations define the proposed service scope: “Fixed satellite service (FSS), mobile satellite service (MSS), direct-to-device (D2D) services via satellite using MSS, and D2D services via satellite using IMT (international mobile telecommunications) spectrum should be permitted through the satellite communication networks of SCN provider authorised entities.”

The wording places four service types within the SCN framework:

• Fixed satellite service, or FSS.
• Mobile satellite service, or MSS.
• Direct-to-device service using satellite and MSS spectrum.
• Direct-to-device service using satellite and IMT spectrum.

An SCN provider may seek appropriate FSS or MSS spectrum from the central government. It may also use spectrum assigned to a partnering service provider when supplying satellite network capacity. This gives the framework two channels for spectrum access, but both retain a government role in allocation.

What does this change for Indian consumers?

It changes the proposed route to market, not the present service offer. If adopted, eligible telcos could obtain satellite capacity from an SCN provider and package it for their own customers. The measure would not automatically authorise Starlink to sell its usual consumer package under this wholesale framework.

For OneWeb and Jio, the proposal opens a path through the telco market. For Starlink, it leaves a structural gap between the authorisation and the company’s normal consumer plan. The recommendation does not say how Starlink would bridge that gap, and it names no partner, pricing plan or commercial launch schedule.

The source also provides no subscriber target, coverage footprint, throughput figure, spectrum price, investment amount or commercial timetable for any of the three applicants. Those omissions matter because enthusiasm among prospective licence holders does not establish consumer demand or a service-ready network. The measurable facts remain the proposed licence term, the service categories and the sequence of clearances and spectrum assignments.

The maximum initial licence term is 20 years, with renewal for up to another 20 years. During the licence term, authorised SCN entities could provide SCNaaS to eligible service providers. The long term gives prospective operators room to plan investment, but it does not itself commit the government to assign spectrum or any applicant to launch.

The next milestones are security clearances, TRAI-backed spectrum assignment and central-government access to usable FSS or MSS frequencies. Until those steps occur, India’s new wholesale satellite-broaddown route remains a proposal rather than an operating consumer service.