What the data is and from where do we get it?
Telecom Base stations are radio transmitters/receivers which maintain the communication between the network and the mobile users through a radio link. The data is showing the trend for major suppliers of Telecom Base stations to US from January 2009 to December 2020. It is collected from S&P’s global database Panjiva using HS Code 851761 and presented in the form of a stacked area chart.
How does it look like?
Explaining the stacked area chart above:
US imports of mobile phone base stations from January 2010 to January 2021; This graph looks at the total of past 12 months at each month which means that the graph on January 21 is the total of imports from the country from January 2020 to December 2020.
| Timeline | Events |
|---|---|
| From Jan 2010 to Jan 2012 | EU was the major supplier followed by China, Mexico, and South Korea |
| From Jan 2012 to Jan 2013 | China turned out to be the major supplier followed by Mexico, EU, and South Korea. |
| From Jan 2013 to Jan 2014 | Mexico turned out to be a major supplier followed by China and then South Korea and the EU. |
| From Jan 2014 to Jan 2019 | China is the major supplier followed by the EU while there were negligible supplies from Mexico and South Korea moving towards Jan 2019. |
| From Jan 2019 to Jan 2020 | China is the major supplier followed by the EU and Indonesia has also emerged as a supplier towards the end of 2019. |
| From Jan 2020 to Jan 2021 | Other countries and Indonesia have emerged as the major supplier to the US followed by China, EU, and negligible supplies from Mexico and no supplies from South Korea. |
Why does this data matter?
The key finding from the graph points to the fact that there is no stable source from which the US imports telecom base stations. For example, Indonesia started playing a role in January 2019 replacing China which had been the major supplier before that. A decade before that, EU countries were leading supplies while by 2020, they were negligible.
This provides a critical opportunity for India to step in and emerge as the next supplier in the telecom base station space for a major importer, the US.
