Port Blair, May 03: Recently, BSNL invited bids to set up over 5,000 WiFi hotspots across four zones – Kerala, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, Kolkata, West Bengal and Andaman &Nicobar, Assam and North East I and II zones.
According to reports published in National Media, BSNL will offer bandwidth while capital expenditure will be borne by the service providers/partners, according to a senior official from the company. The contract is expected to be awarded by the end of this month.
BSNL, over a period of last two years, has set up about 10,000 WiFi hotspots. It targets to take this number to 1,00,000 including, 25,000 in rural areas by 2019. Under the latest project, the plan is to set up and operate a WiFi network to provide high-speed broadband services and other telecom services on a revenue-sharing basis. The project seeks to cover areas that are not technically feasible and other upcoming areas in urban and rural areas. The access points, as well as WiFi equipments will be set up, owned, operated and managed by the partner who will win the bid.
In February this year, BSNL announced that its subscribers with Android or iOS smartphones would be able to access the 44 million Wi-Fi hotspots in more than 100 countries including in international flights and rail systems with the upgraded version of My BSNL app. (Source: http://www.dnaindia.com)
