India’s biggest telecom companies, led by rival billionaires Mukesh Ambani and Sunil Bharti Mittal, are primed to launch satellite internet services as they challenge Elon Musk’s attempts to establish Starlink in the country. Bharti Airtel’s joint venture with Eutelsat OneWeb, the Anglo-French satellite communications group, could start operating as early as June and Ambani’s JioSpaceFiber expects to follow later this year, according to four people familiar with the matter.
” Bharti Airtel was in discussions to provide internet to India’s army and navy in remote areas without conventional broadband services, said one of the people close to the company, adding that it had “a leg up compared to the competition”. Ambani’s Reliance Industries, which owns India’s largest telecoms network with just over half of the nation’s 924mn wireless and wired broadband subscribers, is still awaiting the nod from the nation’s space industry regulator, IN-SPACe.