india

Updated: Oct 21, 2019 05:53 IST

The Indian 5G market will be “enormous” in the long run, a new Chinese government book on the worldwide state of the internet released on Sunday predicted, adding that India has made fast progress in recent years with significant increases in internet penetration rate and number of users going online.

Fuelling the internet boom in India is venture capital (VC) from China that amounted to some $5.6 billion in 2018, said the book, released at the 6th World Internet Conference in the water town of Wuzhen in eastern China’s Zhejiang province.

Quoting data until March this year, it said: “Chinese VC invested in India was $5.6 billion in 2018, nine times of the $668 million in 2016.” The book, compiled by the Chinese government-run Chinese Academy of Cyberspace Studies (CACS), added: “The GSM Association, a trade body for network operators, predicted that by 2025 half of the US population will be connected to 5G services and the proportion of the population connected to 5G in China and India will be 30 percent and 3 percent respectively... The Indian 5G market will be an enormous one in the long run.”

5G refers to the fifth generation of cellular technology, which will be much faster and have more capacity than the earlier generations. Chinese telecom giant Huawei is said to be among the companies in the fray to bag the 5G license in India despite running into controversies in other countries including the US over allegations of spying for the Chinese government. The company has denied the charges.

Titled ‘World Internet Development Report’, the book analysed 48 countries on various parameters related to the internet, ranking India eight on overall global internet development index (GIDI). Topping the list is the US, followed by China.

CACS critically analysed the internet sector in India, which it recognised as the “world’s second-largest telecommunications market after China with 295 million out of its 400 million-plus urban population using mobile phones to access the internet”.

CACS estimated that “nearly 200 million out of its 900 million-plus rural population used the internet and the number is still rising”. The VC investment from China to India has increased for a reason, says Liu Xiaoxue, expert on the Indian economy, from Beijing’s Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. “First, India’s stock market has performed very well in recent years and is considered one of the best in Asia. Second, India is a promising ICT (information and communications technology) market attracting VC from around the world,” Xiaoxue said. The book said that “with its 1.3 billion people and 560 million mobile internet users, India has registered rapid growth in the internet industry in the past five years, prompting “investors and IT professions see India as the “billion-person market after China”.

Several Chinese companies including tech giants Alibaba and Tencent, and newer entrants such as ByteDance, have invested in India. Their target sectors include localised and financial services, e-commerce, gaming, entertainment, and transportation such as cab-hailing services.

Beijing-based ByteDance’s overseas venture, the social media app Tiktok, has more than 200 million active users, according to reports. India, however, lags in internet-related infrastructure, the policy book says. “India ranks 23rd in composite GIDI and specifically 42nd in infrastructure, 13th in innovation, 21st in industrial development, 11th in internet applications, 38th in cybersecurity and 19th in internet governance,” the book said. “The Global Innovation Index 2019 identifies India as the regional leader in central and south Asia. Bangalore, Mumbai and New Delhi are among top 100 global science and technology clusters,” it added.

China’s own numbers related to the internet are impressive. “In June 2019, China had 854 million internet users and 5.18 million websites, and the internet penetration rate was 61.2%,” the book said. More than 847 million Chinese used mobile phones to surf the internet. The internet in China is heavily censored, and the book said, invoking President Xi Jinping, “...China has been enhancing the construction and management of web content and promoting positive energy with extensive coverage of the Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics in the New Era…”