Private 5G networks will enable 'hero' uses of the technology, says Intel India head

Private 5G networks will help India realize maximum use cases of the technology, Intel India’s country head Nivruti Rai said.

The global chipmaker is collaborating with enterprises to deploy 5G networks at their factories, Rai added.

“Private 5G is the way to go for India to show hero use cases of 5G. We may not be able to put 5G to full-scale deployment, but we should try out these private 5G uses,” Rai, who is also the vice president of Intel Foundry Services, said. “I do want to participate and there are companies that we are working with to make their factories deploy 5G.”


Intel, however, did not specify whether it would seek 5G spectrum from the government directly as a non-telecom player.

The company has also ruled out directly participating in the government's subsidy scheme for setting up semiconductor manufacturing units in the country.

The remarks have come at a time when telecom operators and technology companies are at loggerheads over the government’s approval for a policy that enables non-telecom companies to purchase non-public captive or private 5G networks.

Telecom industry body, Cellular Operat­ors’ Association of India, has said that there is no justification for allocating radi­o waves directly to enterprises for operating private captive networks.

It has said that licensed telecom players are fully capable of providing customized solutions in a competitive and economic manner to private and public sector entities.

The company is helping the ecosystem in areas such as intellectual property, printed circuit boards companies and designing startups to create a demand for chips, Rai said.

The gestation period for a fabrication unit to fully function takes five years on average, she added.

The company on Friday opened its eighth design and engineering centre in the country, at Bengaluru.

It added a 453,000-square-foot centre across two towers, which can accommodate 2,000 employees.

The centre will work on areas such as design and engineering in data centres, Internet of Things, graphics, artificial intelligence, and the automotive segment.