Another major communications deal involving india’s oil industry has been announced as broadband satellite and managed network services provider Hughes Communications India (HCI) says it has been chosen to deploy and manage a software-defined wide area network (SD-WAN) for Indian Oil Corporation Ltd (IOCL) across its 10,800-site retail enterprise network.
This is a five-year contract which, is according to HCI, valued at more than Rs 100 crore (about US$12.5 million).
The HughesON Managed SD-WAN solution will power IOCL’s retail automation and critical business processes such as payment processing, daily price updates, remote desktop protocol (RDP) software and network monitoring, with enterprise-grade connectivity, quality of service and 24x7 support throughout 28 states and seven union territories.
Offered under the HughesON portfolio of managed services, the IOCL network from HCI includes design, deployment and network optimisation with dual 4G connectivity for resiliency. The solution includes access to the HughesON portal, enabling localised and system-wide data insights to help inform business decision-making. At each site a Hughes IN500X terminal will be deployed with zero-touch provisioning, industry-standard network protocols, centralised configuration management and two ports for best available LTE connectivity from local telecom providers.
HCI already connects over 25,000 retail petroleum outlets. Under separate contracts, Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL), Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd (HPCL), Nayara Energy and Reliance-BP use Hughes technology to enable fast retail transactions, eliminate manual interference, and deliver accurate, real-time data across their operations nationwide.
This is the second big oil-related communications contract announced in India in recent weeks. As we reported at the time, Oil India Limited, the country’s second largest state-owned oil and gas company, has selected Juniper Networks, which describes itself as a leader in secure, AI-driven networks, for upgrades to its data centre and campus networks.
