APPENDIX I
STATEMENT OF OBJECTS AND REASONS

One of the basic objectives of this Act is to provide for a regulatory mechanism, which facilitates convergence and therefore, remains valid over a period of time. Convergence in this context means convergence of mediums or technologies facilitating provision of all services by using a given facility or network and vice versa. It also means convergence of services at the provider's end as well as the consumer's end, meaning, thereby, a service provider should be able to provide a whole range of technologically feasible services and a consumer should be able to receive all services through a given terminal at any time and place of his choice.

These objectives are intended to be achieved by providing for licences in the following four categories, namely;

(a)
 Network infrastructure facilities;
(b)
 Network services;
(c)
 Application services; and
(d)
 Content application services.

 

 The above classification is technology-neutral and service sector-neutral. Setting
up an infrastructural facility and its use is not linked to the provision of a particular service by using a particular technology. Similarly, services can be provided by using any facility and any technology. Thus the classification of licences under these four categories aims to achieve the basic objective of convergence.
CONVERGENCE

Convergence commonly refers to the provision of different kinds of services over the existing infrastructure and the enhancement of existing technologies so as to provide a wide variety of services. This results from the blurring of borders between telecommunications, computing and media. The continuous development of new technologies results in an inability to predict the future evolution of convergence viz. the development of new services like web-casting, Internet Telephony etc. resulting in the need for regulations which does not aim to predict the future, but aspires to be flexible enough to accommodate and propagate any permutation and combination of technologies and services.

The licensing structure has hence been broken into its different elements which leads to a four layered hierarchical structure where each layer is dependent on one or more of the earlier layers for the provision of services. The structure results in four different service providers namely;

  • Network infrastructure facility provider;
  • Network service provider;
  • Application service provider (ASP), and
  • Content ASP

Network infrastructure facilities refer to the provision of physical infrastructure which would be utilised by other licences for providing various services. The infrastructure set up by any network facility provider could cut across the infrastructure set up by various licences as they exist today (i.e across the basic, cellular, VSAT, satellite and other forms of infrastructure).

The network service provider utilises the infrastructure set up by one or more network facility providers to carry various kinds of services. The network service provider would have the flexibility to carry the application/content of various ASPs and also be flexible to utilise the infrastructure set up by one or more network facility providers (and thus carry the application/content across one or more of the different types of networks).

The application services provider (ASP)/ content providers services to the end consumer using the services of one or more network service providers.

The proposed Bill envisages that in an era of convergence, an ASP/ content ASP could utilise the services of any network service provider for carrying their application/content. In turn, the network service provider would have the flexibility to utilise the infrastructure provided by any network facility provider and to carry application/content from any ASP/content ASP. Similarly the network facility provider can provide the infrastructure to any network service provider.