Last week, Ericsson hosted its 2026 Analyst Event in New Delhi, bringing together Ericsson leaders and industry analysts from various organisations. The event provided an opportunity to engage with Ericsson’s management team, exchange perspectives with fellow analysts, and gain deeper insights into the company’s offerings and strategic priorities. Discussions covered a range of key telecom industry developments, including 5G growth in India, the role of reliable networks in healthcare, the business potential of network APIs, networks for AI and AI for networks, and the future of autonomous network operations. The event offered valuable perspectives on the evolving telecom landscape and the opportunities shaping the industry.
Some of the key takeaways from the discussions are outlined below.
India is showing significant growth deploying 5G networks to support enterprises in delivering applications that demand faster speeds, wider bandwidth, and lower latency to provide their customers an enriching user experience. During the event, the scale of India’s 5G ecosystem was highlighted, with more than 430 million 5G subscriptions, over 65% of which are on 5G Standalone (SA) networks, and 5G accounting for 43% of mobile traffic. These figures underscore the growing role of 5G in India’s connectivity landscape. The increasing adoption of 5G SA, in particular, points to the development of network capabilities that can support more advanced services and enterprise use cases. As the ecosystem continues to evolve, 5G is expected to play an important role in enabling new digital services, supporting enterprise transformation and contributing to India’s broader digital economy.
Delivering effective patient care through technology driven innovations is being witnessed as a significant shift undergoing in the healthcare industry. The use of XR-powered devices is emerging in OT rooms and AI-based wearable devices are being leveraged to monitor discharged patients. As a result, the role of reliable cellular networks is growing, and 5G networks can effectively support healthcare professionals to deliver various healthcare services that include remote patient monitoring, remote surgery, connected ambulance, and chronic disease management. In critical operations such as remote surgery can greatly benefit from the use of 5G’s Ultra Reliable Low Latency Communication (URLLC) feature to provide uninterrupted internet connectivity.
Indian Railways represent an important market for Ericsson, given the mission-critical nature of railway operations and the need for reliable, secure and continuous connectivity. 5G can support the modernisation of railway systems across both safety-critical operations and passenger services, enabling operators to improve situational awareness, operational efficiency and the overall travel experience. On the safety and operations side, potential use cases include remote driving assistance, platform CCTV and video analytics, level-crossing monitoring, and operational voice communications. These applications depend on reliable connectivity to help railway personnel monitor conditions, communicate effectively and respond to incidents. Beyond safety, 5G can also support connected passenger services, including high-speed internet access and real-time travel information.
The opportunity is reinforced by India’s investment in railway modernisation. The Union Budget 2026–27 allocated INR7,500 crore (approximately USD800 million) for railway signalling and telecommunications works. This investment highlights the importance of modernising the communications and control infrastructure underpinning railway operations, creating a relevant opportunity for mission-critical connectivity solutions as Indian Railways continues its digital transformation.
Network API coverage is expanding steadily across regions, and businesses across various sectors are adopting them to enhance their business applications. The use of cellular network APIs allows enterprises to use APIs to develop a wide range of innovative applications that leverage advanced mobile network capabilities which can support them to achieve operational efficiencies, enhance user experience, improve connectivity experience, and curbing cybercrimes related to identity and authentication fraud. Their commercial success will depend on how effectively operators, and their ecosystem partners translate these technical capabilities into solutions that address specific business needs. A recent report by Transforma Insights, 'Cellular network APIs: incorporating network data into IoT applications' examined many of the key themes related to hat cellular network APIs are, their benefits, and the drivers and challenges for adoption of network APIs
The relationship between AI and telecom networks is becoming increasingly important. On one hand, AI can help operators improve network operations, optimise performance, manage complexity and automate tasks. The first reflects how networks must evolve to support the growing range of AI applications, which can place new demands on connectivity, latency and network performance. The second focuses on how AI can help operators improve network efficiency, automate operations and manage increasingly complex environments.
The latter is something we highlighted two years ago in our report, 'Communications Service Providers are deploying AI to revolutionise their operations'. At the time, we explored how communications service providers were applying AI to address network complexity, improve network quality and enhance operational efficiency. Ericsson highlighted ‘AI in the Radio Access Network (RAN)’ as one of the key areas in this evolving landscape. The approach is now moving beyond using AI to support network management towards embedding AI directly into RAN functions. Ericsson’s AI in RAN proposition focuses on applying specialised AI models within the radio network to optimise functions such as link adaptation and beamforming in real time. Ericsson says these capabilities can improve downlink throughput by up to 20% and spectral efficiency by up to 10%, while also helping operators manage network resources more effectively. The company reports more than 15 deployments and trials worldwide, demonstrating growing industry interest in embedding AI directly into radio networks. These include trials and collaborations involving operators such as Bell Canada, Deutsche Telekom, SK Telecom and Singtel.
Enterprise operations are becoming more distributed, mobile, automated and AI-enabled, changing the role that wireless connectivity plays in industrial and business environments. As processes increasingly depend on connected equipment, mobile workers, autonomous systems and real-time data, network requirements are evolving. The focus is shifting from simply measuring network performance to assuring operational outcomes: ensuring that connectivity is reliable, predictable and fit for the task it supports.
Several developments are raising the bar for assured wireless operations. Private 5G is evolving to support more demanding enterprise use cases, while physical AI is emerging, bringing greater intelligence to machines, robots and other systems operating in the real world. At the same time, small-cell deployments and neutral-host models are advancing, helping extend reliable wireless coverage and capacity across complex enterprise environments. Together, these shifts reinforce the need to treat wireless connectivity not simply as infrastructure, but as a critical enabler of enterprise performance, automation and resilience.
As networks grow more complex and support a wider range of services, automation will be essential to managing operations efficiently. AI-driven and autonomous network capabilities can help operators identify issues, optimise network performance and automate operational decisions. This is particularly relevant as operators seek to accommodate growing traffic and emerging AI-driven services without a corresponding increase in operational complexity.
Ericsson’s analyst event highlighted how the next phase of India’s digital infrastructure will be shaped not just by expanding connectivity, but by making networks more intelligent, reliable and capable of supporting new services. From mission-critical applications in healthcare and railways to network APIs, AI in RAN and autonomous network operations, the discussions pointed to a broader evolution in the role of telecom networks. The challenge now is to translate these capabilities into tangible business value, while building the partnerships and ecosystem needed to scale them. As India’s 5G market matures, the ability to combine connectivity with intelligence and automation will be an important factor in unlocking the next wave of growth.
