Apple , Google and Samsung jointly said on Wednesday that they will launch software updates in India, the world's second largest wireless market, to enable their respective mobile phone products to support 5G, and just a few days ago, local governments began to push these mobile phone manufacturers to speed up their efforts. Reliance Jio and Airtel, India’s two largest operators, have begun offering 5G services in selected Indian cities in recent weeks, but many of the country’s popular phones do not currently support local signals.
These smartphones have 5G hardware capabilities, but manufacturers need to work with local network operators to release software updates to enable support for their networks.
For this, Apple said today that it will release a software update in December to enable 5G on iPhone used in India. Apple introduced 5G for the first time in iPhone 12 in 2020.
"We are working with carrier partners in India to bring the best 5G experience to iPhone users as soon as possible after network verification and quality and performance testing is completed." Apple said in a statement: "5G will be enabled with software updates and will be launched to iPhone users starting in December."
Google is also committed to providing software updates to its devices -- although it does not provide a specific launch timeframe.
"Pixel 7, 7 Pro and Pixel 6a are devices with 5G capabilities. We are actively working with Indian operators to enable features as early as possible," a Google spokesperson said in a statement. Google launched the Pixel 6a in India in July, and the Pixel 7 series will also be available soon.
Similar to Apple and Google, Samsung, the country's second largest smartphone supplier, is also working to bring software upgrades to enable local signals for all 5G phones in the country.
"Samsung has been a pioneer in the development of 5G technology since 2009 and has played a leading role in the standardization of 5G technology worldwide. In India, Samsung has the widest portfolio of 5G devices. We are working closely with our carrier partners and are committed to launching the OTA update on all of our 5G devices by mid-November 2022, allowing Indian consumers to experience 5G seamlessly," a spokesperson for Samsung India said in a statement.
In July this year, India sold 5G licenses for a record $19 billion in an auction. Billionaire Mukesh-Ambani Jio company bought most of the spectrum and promised to spend at least $25 billion on launching and expanding its 5G services alone. This South Asian country is one of the last major markets to adopt 5G and is also a large population, so the industry has high hopes for its potential.
"5G is the stepping stone to a new era in the country." Prime Minister Narendra Modi (Narendra Modi) said at an event last month: "This is the beginning of an infinite sky full of opportunities."
In the smartphone market in India, both Apple and Google devices have only a small market share. Apple accounts for only 4% of the local smartphone market, while Google's figures are unavailable due to relatively low sales. According to analysis company Counterpoint, total shipments of 5G smartphones in India were 50 million in July.
According to the support page of operator Bharti Airtel, some products from Chinese manufacturers such as Xiaomi , OPPO, vivo, Realme and OnePlus have already supported their 5G services.
It is worth noting that Airtel has enabled its 5G services in 8 cities, and Reliance Jio has enabled them in 4 cities through an invitation program. The goal of these two network providers is to expand 5G coverage across the country in the coming years. Airtel's chairman Sunil Bharti Mittal said the company's goal is to cover all parts of its eight startup cities by March 2023 and to cover the entire country by 2023. Reliance Jio has a pretty ambitious goal as it plans to launch 5G services nationwide by 2023.
