The government gives 3.4 billion rubles for the production of base stations for mobile communications

The government will additionally allocate 3.4 billion rubles. for the production of domestic base stations (BS) by the end of 2023. This was announced by Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin at an operational meeting with deputy prime ministers on August 7.

“In order to make it easier for operators to switch to fifth-generation mobile networks, this year we will allocate an additional 3.5 billion rubles. – This is for the production of base stations in our country. In total, almost 12 billion rubles have been allocated from the budget for these purposes over the past three years. The adopted decision will provide cellular coverage on the hardware base, which is made in Russia,” the Prime Minister said.

Budgetary funds will be allocated from the government’s reserve fund to provide subsidies to KNS Group (Yadro) “for reimbursement of costs aimed at creating by the specified company a subsystem of base stations of the GSM / LTE / NR (5G) standard for public communication networks, including using the Russian electronic component base”, follows from the order published on the website of the Cabinet of Ministers.

This amount should compensate for part of the cost of creating a BS in accordance with the roadmap for the development of the high-tech direction “Modern and promising mobile networks” until 2030, the document says.

The main item of expenditure in the roadmap falls on the production of domestic telecom equipment for cellular networks. In accordance with the roadmap, which Vedomosti wrote about at the end of December 2022, the pledged amount of state funding for these purposes is more than 120 billion rubles. until 2030, of which in 2023 it was planned to allocate 11.8 billion rubles.

A government representative forwarded Vedomosti’s request to the Ministry of Digital Development. “Funding for the creation of base stations from the federal budget was initially provided,” said a representative of the Ministry of Digital Development. He clarified that this year financing in the amount of 3.4 billion rubles. provided for the creation of GSM/LTE base stations, as well as 5G. This amount is included in the planned 11.8 billion rubles.

The government representative forwarded the request to the Ministry of Digital Development. Vedomosti sent a request to KNS Group.

At the end of December 2022, the Big Four operators entered into forward contracts with domestic BS manufacturers for a total amount of more than RUB 100 billion. with a total supply of 75,000 base stations until 2030, RIA Novosti reported in January, citing Deputy Minister Dmitry Kim. According to the plan, Russian telecom equipment will begin to be put into commercial operation in 2025, and from 2028 only Russian stations can be used.

At the first stage samples of domestic base stations on networks of operators will be tested, the representative of Mintsifra noted. During 2024, there will be a gradual increase in their functionality, and by the end of next year or by the beginning of 2025, the first fully functional BS will be installed on the networks of operators, he added. The first testing in real conditions in the fall of 2023 will begin “Beeline”, wrote Vedomosti on July 20.

Representatives of Beeline, Megafon and Rostelecom refrained from commenting. Representative MTS ignored Vedomosti’s request.

The volume of state support in the amount of 12 billion rubles. within three years and 3.5 billion rubles. in 2023 is insufficient, according to the source of Vedomosti in one of the telecom operators. For comparison, the annual investment in R&D of one of the world’s main vendors of telecom equipment Huawei 161.5 billion yuan (almost 2.17 trillion rubles), which is 25.1% of the company’s total income, follows from the company’s financial statements for 2022.

Financing will go both to the development of the BS, and to the release of experimental batches for testing and pre-production, says the author of the Abloud62 Telegram channel, Alexei Boyko.

In an ideal world, the full financing of existing programs for the development of mobile networks could be a serious stepping stone for the creation of domestic base stations, Alexander Sivolobov, an expert in wireless communications and the Internet of things, believes. But in the current situation, the amount of state support should at least cover the difference between the average cost of BS in the international market and in the Russian one, says Telecom Daily CEO Denis Kuskov. The cost of the station will include the cost of developing a solution for a small market, so it will cost much more in production, he explained.