Bharti Airtel Launches 4G Services in India Starting Today in Kolkata

Bharti Airtel launched 4G (TD-LTE) services in Kolkata today. Airtel is the first carrier to launch 4G services in India. Airtel has partnered with Chinese telecom equipment maker ZTE to plan, design, supply and deploy 4G network in Kolkata.

Along with Kolkata Airtel has licenses for three other telecom circles in India including, Karnataka, Punjab, and Maharashtra (excluding Mumbai). Airtel won BWA spectrum in 2010 for all this telecom circles. It will roll out 4G services in all these circles at some point in the near future, the next Airtel 4G services will roll out in Bangalore.

First 3G services in India started rolling out in 2008 with MTNL being the first carrier, but until 2010 and 2011 private carriers didn’t start the 3G services. Infact 3G is not completely rolled out in India till now. Now we are into 4G services already, we are not sure how far this service will get traction. In any case India has joined the list of countries offering 4G services with the launch in Kolkata.

Devices

There are no 4G enabled devices in the market that can support the 4G (TD-LTE) network right now, with the introduction of 4G network today we might see 4G smartphones and tablets in the near future, but for now you have to depend on 4G dongles if you want to have the taste of broadband wireless network.

Airtel is offering 4G LTE devices, pricing is not clear for these devices. You can find more details on Airtel 4G webpage. There are two types of device, one is 4G USB dongle and other is Wireless modem which can support multiple devices.

Plans and Pricing

Airtel is offering three plans currently, the details are given in the below table. These plans are available for both Prepaid and Postpaid plans.