Govt to soon roll out new telecom policy: Pilot

Chennai, PTI: The government would soon roll out a new telecom policy leading to the second phase of revolution in the telecommunication industry, Minister of State for IT and Telecommunication Sachin Pilot said today.

"...as of July 4, we have about 93 crore mobile phones.

In the first phase of telecom revolution between 1998 and 2006, we saw exponential growth..there were about 15-18 million mobile handsets or SIM cards issued every month. Now we have a new telecom policy in place, which is almost ready to roll out," he told reporters here.

He was speaking after inaugurating the new Research and Development facility of digital switch equipment manufacturer Alcatel-Lucent India.

Noting that voice and SMS would not be predominant revenue generators for companies in the second phase of the telecom revolution, he said data services, information and entertainment applications would shape the landscape of the telecommunication and IT industry.