TelecomLive April-2020

Covid-19 www.telecomlive.com 28 Telecom LIVE April 2020 YouTube, Voot, Alt Balaji, SunNXT, Sony Liv, Viuclip and Hoichoi among others. Various OTT players have reduced their streaming on mobile. What impact has it made in data consumption? It has potentially freed up as much as 20 per cent of telecom network capacity. What are the steps taken by the telcos to manage the huge demand of data during the lockdown period? The telecom operators are work- ing together to provide seamless connectivity and internet band- width to the consumers. Specific measures are being taken to resolve issues to provide uninter- rupted services. Telcos are plan- How much surge in data traf- fic have you seen during the lockdown period? There has been about 15-22 per cent surge in demand for data in the last few days. TSPs are work- ing 24x7 to ensure the networks remained available 99.99 per cent of the time. In terms of Mobile network there is a shift in traffic hotspots and peak usage hours and the telcos are prepared to meet this demand. Home Broadband cus- tomers are upgrading to faster speeds and larger quota plans to support work from home and study from home requirements. The B2B customers are utilising 4G dongles, Home Fiber connec- tions and larger enterprise bandwidths which are all being serviced smoothly. What suggestions have you made to the OTT players in terms of downloads? As people are in lockdown or self-quarantine, in the last few days, there has been a spike in data consumption and demand across categories especially OTT videos. Subscriptions have also doubled, which is creating extra pressure on the network. We had written a letter to the content streaming platforms urging them to use data as minimally and effi- ciently, to offset the surge in demand for internet. The letter specifically recommends to reduce the HD streaming to SD during the lockdown period. We have requested to OTT players like Netflix, Amazon Prime, ZEE5, Interview with DG COAI Part-3 “No-HD streaming has freed up as much as 20 pc of telecom network capacity” Rajan S Mathews, Director General, COAI