Promise & politics of 6G

Dinesh C. Sharma
Science Commentator

The Centre recently unveiled the Bharat 6G Vision Statement about next-generation communication technology. The futuristic technology of 6G is a great advance over 5G, which telecom service providers rolled out last year and which most users are yet to experience. Though yet to become a reality, 6G is projected to push the boundaries of communication with a bandwidth of 1 terabit (one trillion bits) per second — 100 times faster than 5G. The network latency or response time in 6G will be less than a millisecond, which can revolutionise human-to-human, machine-to-machine and human-to-machine interactions.

Along with R&D funding, India must participate in global exercises of protocol and standard setting. Without these steps, the vision document will remain a mere wish list.

The practical implications of such a network would be unimaginable, touching every aspect of life — from education and health to transportation and manufacturing. Significantly, defence experts have argued that 6G should be taken up as a strategic endeavour on a par with investments made in sectors like space and nuclear energy. This was articulated by Lt Gen SS Mehta (retd) in The Tribune in 2020.

Tactile Internet and holographic communication could become a reality with 6G. This network will be able to support Augmented Reality, Virtual Reality and Mixed Reality. It would not only enhance user experience but could potentially transform economies. Making 6G happen would require new network technologies, devices, standards and so on. While we are still to experience the full potential of 5G, serious efforts have begun to develop the next-generation communication technology.

India’s vision document says that India being the world’s second-largest telecom market should evolve to become a Net technology provider and a leading manufacturer. Therefore, it should actively participate in defining the contours of the sixth-generation telecom technology. The government had in 2022 formed a set of task forces that were specifically asked to ‘investigate how India can realise its mission of becoming a global leader in this space’. The document, released by PM Modi on March 22, seeks to identify priority areas for R&D to be undertaken by industry, academia and service providers to develop new technologies, proof-of-concept prototypes, etc. This is to be achieved in two stages — explorative research in phase 1 (2023 to 2025) and the development of intellectual property and test beds leading to commercialisation in phase 2 (2025-2030).

The objective is to develop affordable, ubiquitous and sustainable technologies. This is a tall order because 5G does not have any of these attributes at present. So, India is not only aiming at a technological leapfrog for 6G but also saying it will make it cost-effective, available everywhere (35,000 Indian villages do not even have 2G in 2023) and make it sustainable. In addition, 6G technologies developed in India will be made available to the world. All this makes the document ambitious.

The world is witnessing a flurry of activity to take a lead in what is being dubbed 6G supremacy. The industry-led Next G Alliance of North America has identified 50 technological areas covering system components, radio technologies, network architecture, security, reliability, privacy and resilience. South Korea established three 6G research centres in universities in 2021 and is promoting joint R&D by small and medium enterprises, universities and research centres. The European 6G Vision is focusing on intelligent network management and control, integrated wireless sensing and communication, energy efficiency and scalability. In Japan, the Integrated Optical and Wireless Network Forum has plans to develop technologies for cognitive capacity, responsiveness, scalability and energy efficiency. 6G is among the technologies in which China wants to lead in the next decade.

India’s vision document identifies key research pathways ‘that are being pursued globally and that are particularly relevant for ideating new possibilities in the Indian context’. For it to be translated into strategies and programmes will require long-term funding for R&D. The Next G Alliance’s list of founding members includes AT&T, Bell, Intel, Samsung, Apple, Dell, Cisco, Ericsson, Google, Hewlett Packard, LG, Microsoft, Nokia, etc. The 6G initiatives in Korea, Japan and Europe also have large industry participation as well as government support.

In contrast, the Indian plan is fully government-led. Telecom manufacturers and service providers will hopefully participate but are not going to lead. Research universities like the IITs are already working on new technologies and they should be encouraged further. For the commercialisation of 6G technologies, a strong industry-academia partnership is vital. The Department of Science and Technology announced a programme on Cyber-Physical Systems — a 6G technology component — five years ago but it has made little progress.

If India is serious about developing 6G technologies and applications, the government needs to commit to R&D funding either through existing agencies or a new mechanism. The vision document is ambivalent on this. It only talks about creating ‘a large corpus of R&D funds to facilitate various funding instruments such as grants, loans, VC fund, etc.’ and mentions a ballpark figure of Rs 10,000 crore for the next 10 years. It does not say that government funding is critical.

The only notable success in indigenous telecom research in India — a digital rural switch developed in the 1980s — was a result of government funding. The Centre for Development of Telematics (C-DOT) was established to develop the digital telephone exchange for rural areas. It was given a budget of Rs 36 crore and a time of 36 months, and it delivered. The technology was transferred to private companies in India and was later widely disseminated in several developing countries. There is no reason the same model can’t be adapted for 6G. Along with R&D funding, India must actively participate in global exercises of protocol and standard setting for next-generation technologies because the telecom business is standards-based. Without these necessary steps, the 6G vision document will remain a mere wish list.