Indian vague data regulations should change to aid innovation says Intel executive

• Data is booming and will only continue to increase as 5G networks come in.
  
• Prakash Mallya, MD for marketing at Intel India explains why India’s data regulations need to stay open to support that growth and how monetisation is the biggest challenge that telecom operators face.
  
• He points out that India’s growth has always been disruption led and how every service will need to be cloud based.
  

As Indian businesses and consumers eagerly await 5G connectivity, the government is expected to do more than auction the spectrum. It also needs to figure out how it wants to manage its data.

"Every country will regulate data differently, and India would do the same, in my opinion," Prakash Mallya, MD for marketing at Intel India, told Business Insider at the India Mobile Congress (IMC) 2019.

India’s Personal Data Privacy Bill is yet to be finalised and the National Digital Communications Policy 2018 doesn’t address 5G networks.

The first draft of the proposed Personal Data Privacy Bill caused a lot of concern for consumers and businesses alike with vague terminology. Experts also wonder if its Its broad definition of data can translate into restrictive regulations.

"Historically everything that we have been able to do — the innovation and disruption — is open and everybody can participate," said Mallya.

He believes that "it will go down this way" because India’s technological advancement is based on digitisation and impact.

The hybrid approach

As workloads and regulations continue to evolve, one size will not fit all. Companies are likely to take a hybrid or multi-cloud approach according to the requirements of regulation.

Some data would be stored on premise — like design data, proprietary information of customers or anything that’s "make or break" for the company. Other data — like e-mail, human resources and accounting — can end up on the cloud.

"You can have multiple cloud service providers, some on-premise, and you could have the private cloud — all working seamlessly within the organisation. You would be able to burst out onto different clouds at different points of time," explained Mallya.

Telecom companies and monetisation

"Ultimately, telecom operators and all the other industry need usage models, which can make money for the industry," stated Mallya.

With 5G coming in, telecom operators are going to have a lot more data coming in. This is especially true since most are looking at businesses and large operators for monetization opportunities.

"They (telecom operators) engage with consumers, they build businesses and with the advent of 5G and a lot of data coming in — I would profess that I see a big play for telecom service providers in the area of cloud. Every service delivery would be cloud based," said Mallya.

In order for service delivery to be effective, these networks need to be flexible and agile.

"You can’t throw that data back into the data center to analyse. You need low latency which is why edge becomes important," explained Mallya.

Edge is basically a point between the data center and the service provider, which allows data to be processed closer to where it’s actually being created.

According to International Data Corporation (IDC), it’s a "mesh network of micro data centers that process or store critical data locally and push all received data to a central data center or cloud storage repository, in a footprint of less than 100 square feet."

"That’s why to have an edge which has intelligence and capabilities to really use the data that comes through right at the minute over there to analyse and throw back intelligent information is going to be viral," said Mallya.

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