Bharti Airtel – Can Postpaid differentiate customers and still be net neutral?

More than 10 years after Bharti Airtel first stirred up the Net Neutrality debate, it has once again set that debate in motion. This time around, the bone of contention has been its relatively controversial “Priority Postpaid Plan”, based on 5G slicing.

After 10 years, the story is still about net neutrality

Back in 2015, Bharti Airtel announced Airtel Zero, with its Meta-backed Free Basics, allowing free access to certain apps and websites via telecom partnerships. Obviously, it had commercial implications. It raised a furore over network operators prioritizing certain apps and originators, which could stifle the growth of the app ecosystem in India. The plan was quietly shelved, but the controversy led to the government announcing detailed net-neutrality regulations in 2017. That debate has been once again stirred up with Airtel announcing the launch of its “Priority Postpaid Plans”, using 5G slicing technology.

What is 5G slicing and why it is not net neutral?

Slicing is a technology by which the network service provider can prioritize certain bandwidth lanes for select customers. For instance, a priority customer would be someone who gives substantial revenue flows to Bharti Airtel. However, such customers may expect a better network quality and access in times of congestion. That is the gap that 5G slicing looks to fill up. If you are a priority postpaid customer, then you get dedicated highway lanes so your access experience is not impacted even during times of high network congestion. Is that net neutral? On paper, it is not net-neutral because it does differentiate in access; irrespective of how the 5G slicing is justified technically.

What are the arguments against Priority Postpaid Plan?

In fact, there are several arguments against the Priority Postpaid Plan of Airtel. Firstly, critics are of the view that this is nothing but Airtel Zero Part 2. Bharti Airtel is trying to introduce network prioritization through the back door, using slicing as a pretext. Secondly, there is a more practical concern. In India, nearly 95% of the users are prepaid mobile users. As the slicing reserves lanes for priority postpaid users, the prepaid users are likely to see an increased incidence of delayed access, persistent buffering and download failures. Thirdly, the biggest concern is that it could impact millions of students and app developers, who rely on neutral net access for actioning their ideas.

Time to look at 5G slicing pragmatically

There is no rocket science to it. Priority Postpaid is not net neutral, in the strict sense of the term. However, the need of the hour is to have regulations that cater to both; the user and the service originator. Indian telecom players have invested billions of dollars in 5G networks and also taken on huge debt. Indian ARPUs are a tenth of Western ARPUs and one-fourth of Chinese ARPUs. Profitable monetization of the network is a must. While net neutrality has to be the underlying theme, it cannot become the rule book. Provider ROI is also material if the service has to survive. It is time for the government to tweak net neutrality regulations, in a way that it is more pragmatic to both the parties!