Broadband India Forum (BIF) hosted a national workshop on neutral digital connectivity infrastructure (DCI) in buildings which aimed to promote awareness about the benefits of DCI to all states.

The workshop was attended by V. Suresh, former chief managing director (CMD) of HUDCO, Mahendra Srivastava, principal advisor at Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), and Isha Kalia, director, AMRUT, ministry of housing and urban affairs (MoHUA), who gave their insights on DCI. The event featured four sessions, each involving renowned speakers and domain experts from diverse backgrounds. Key areas in these sessions include-

  • Quality of Experience of DCI in buildings from a consumer perspective.
  • DCI, technology, and in-building solutions (IBS) and standards.
  • Provisioning and implementation of DCI in states/union territories (UTs): Addendum to building byelaws, the status of guidelines/ implementation in States/UTs, and certification (OC/CC) thereof
  • Role of DCI in buildings for smart buildings/ smart cities

Dr. R.S. Sharma, former chairman, TRAI, was the chief guest at the event. He led several initiatives to improve in-building connectivity and information and communication technology (ICT) infrastructure in smart buildings. These included recommendations for sharing common telecom infrastructure inside buildings, the first monogram for urban planners, architects, and service providers, and the inclusion of addendum to model building byelaws on DCI in-building in the national building code.

Commenting on the inauguration,Isha Kalia, director, AMRUT, MoHUA, said, “This awareness workshop was very important in the light of increasing awareness about digital connectivity inside buildings amongst the huge ecosystem of builders, developers, architects, etc all of whom need to come on board so that we can implement uniform practices and procedures in-buildings to ensure that we provide the highest quality of digital connectivity in-buildings.”

Meanwhile, Dr. R.S. Sharma, former chairman, TRAI, said, “Creation of awareness among various stakeholders for implementing the concept of neutral DCI in buildings is going to help in proliferation of accessible of quality and affordable broadband for all.”