Elon Musk’s Starlink has begun groundwork in India by holding advanced talks with telecom operators, fibre players, internet exchanges, and data centre companies to build the terrestrial infrastructure required for its rollout. Discussions are reportedly underway with Bharti Airtel, Reliance Jio, and Tata Communications on the telco front, as well as data centre operators like Sify Technologies, STT, Equinix, and CtrlS Datacenters.
Internet exchange providers DE-CIX and Extreme, along with fibre infrastructure companies such as Microscan, are also in talks with Starlink.
DE-CIX last week confirmed its partnership with Starlink, while Extreme IXP said the satellite operator has already connected to its Mumbai port.
“The integration will be crucial for maintaining high-speed throughput, especially for latency-sensitive applications like streaming, video conferencing, and online gaming,” Sudhir Kunder, chief business officer of DE-CIX India was quoted telling Economic Times.
Analysts estimate Starlink’s initial investment in India to be around Rs 500 crore. The company has already secured clearances from Indian regulators and been allotted trial bandwidth, according to Economic Times.
Letters of intent are expected to be sent to partners this month.
Starlink has also finalized 17 locations across India for ground stations, which will be key to integrating its low-earth orbit (LEO) satellites with terrestrial fibre and data networks. These hubs are needed since Indian regulations mandate that all downlink traffic be stored and routed locally.
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