Ashwini Khillan’s first ambition was to join the Indian Administrative Service (IAS), and he held on to it till destiny drove him in another direction. Thus began his stint with telecom. “I have been working in the telecom sector since 1989,” he says. “Once I stepped into the sector, my IAS aspirations disappeared and I got completely involved in telecom.”

Today, as director of Sistema Shyam TeleServices Limited’s (SSTL) network operations, Khillan brings his experience from both the operator and vendor worlds. “My career has spanned the operator, vendor and tower industries. This has helped me gain a perspective of the entire telecom industry value chain,” he says.

In the first seven years of his career, he was working in the telecom equipment manufacturing space and was associated with companies like Punjab Communications Limited (PCL), Himachal Futuristic Communications Limited and Fujitsu. Thereafter, he shifted focus to the Indian mobile industry. On the operator side, he has worked with Fascel (now Vodafone Gujarat) and Idea Cellular before joining SSTL. On the vendor side, he worked with Ericsson and Huawei, and was one of the first employees of the American Tower Company in India.

Thus, he has had an opportunity to see the different facets of the Indian telecom sector. For example, when he first entered the industry, having a landline phone was a luxury. “When I was working with PCL, the company had a single landline connection, which was used for less than an hour every day. We carried out all business transactions through couriers and faxes. Today, telecom has changed the face of businesses and the way people communicate, both professionally and personally.”

Going forward, Khillan predicts a similar revolution in the data-based services segment, as seen in voice-based services. “The manner in which voice has changed the landscape of businesses and personal and professional interactions is similar to the function that data will perform,” he says. At SSTL, his main targets include providing superior network quality to meet customer expectations; keeping the cost of producing minutes and megabits of data to a minimum; and reducing time-to-market by rolling out the network at a fast pace. “The significance of providing a superior customer experience increases as we move from voice to data customers,” he says. 

What helps him tackle day-to-day challenges is his passion for the job and a participative style of management.  Khillan spends all his free time with the family, either watching movies or shopping. He is also an avid cricket follower.