Digital Destiny : The future of connected living in India

With over 20 connected devices per human expected by 2030, we are rapidly moving towards a permanently online, always connected environment. An increasingly digitised and connected world will have a profound impact across a wide array of applications at home and a work, and in cities, healthcare, automotive and several other use cases. The convergence of these environments will result in ubiquitous connectivity and the emergence of new product applications, business models, technologies, platforms and services.

The demand for connected living will be primarily driven by advanced software technology, widespread content streaming and network integration. This rising demand is projected to quadruple smart and connected home penetration over the next five years to reach over 18 per cent by 2025. Spending on the smart city sector is expected to reach $327 billion globally by 2025 at a strong CAGR of 22.7 per cent, and will lead to greater adoption of technologies such as artificial intelligence and 5G.

Connected living is growing rapidly in India, as the country’s digital divide is shrinking fast. According to industry estimates, India is poised to become a country with a billion digital users by 2030. However, for India to reap the full benefits of digitalisation, the role of emerging technologies, and their adoption and convergence, will remain critical.

A look at India’s growth in several key aspects driving connectivity…

Fibre connectivity

A fibre-enabled backhaul is present in less than a quarter of the mobile towers in India. This number pales in comparison to the levels achieved in countries such as China, the US and Japan, where it is present in up to 80 per cent of towers, according to an ICRA report. Fibre deployment rates in India need a significant push to go up from their existing levels of about 25 million fibre kilometres (fkm) per year to around 100 million fkm per year. Broadband infrastructure will play a bigger role going forward, as almost everything has moved online due to the pandemic.

Digitalisation

India is mostly a smartphone-first market, as the country’s PC penetration levels are still among the lowest in the world. Digitalisation has vital importance in creating a cost-effective route to differentiation. Our analysis indicates that digitalising activities occur at a much faster pace in India than in many developed and emerging economies. India has made every effort to take its digital success stories such as Aadhaar, direct benefit transfer and the Unified Payments Interface to other countries as a means of strengthening its ties through “digital diplomacy”.

Data growth and protection

Internet traffic in India is anticipated to grow to 78 exabytes in 2021, a 4x growth from what it was in 2016. Significant growth has been witnessed in personal data, driven by rising smartphone penetration, growth in connected/internet of things devices, e-commerce and social media. But Indian businesses find it difficult to keep pace with rapid changes in data protection tools and techniques, and two out of three businesses do not have a future-proof solution to manage and protect data efficiently. It is important that India adopts a sandbox approach towards regulations, rather than simply creating a hard regulatory regime that will hinder innovation among tech companies.

Fintech

Fintech in India remains an extremely vibrant ecosystem. In fact, Google Pay was tested first in India under the name Tez, before being rolled out across the globe. The digital payments ecosystem has been strengthened further through government programmes such as the Jan Dhan Yojana, which led to the creation of more than 420 million bank accounts, of which over 350 million are operative, with a collective holding of more than $19 billion.

Virtual learning

While systems such as digital payments were already popular when the pandemic hit, other sectors such as telemedicine, edtech and digital entertainment came to the fore following the enforcement of the nationwide lockdown. Many educational institutions are creating virtual learning infrastructure and radically transforming the way education is offered.

Blockchain

IndiaChain, a government-backed blockchain project, is aimed at transforming public administrative services by enabling efficient and transparent distribution of government subsidies, streamlined record-keeping and tax monitoring, and regulated supply chain management.

Robotics

According to the International Federation of Robotics (IFR), India ranks tenth in the world in terms of annual installed base for industrial robots. The IFR has observed that India has doubled the number of industrial robots operating in the country. Among other problems, the lack of a hardware ecosystem is seen as a primary obstruction in the road to making India a leader in robotic technologies.

Conclusion

The adoption of connectivity technologies can be further accelerated by higher data speeds and large cloud infrastructures enabled by 5G, and supported by policy changes and strategic initiatives of the government.