India Wireless Subscribers – March-2007
At the end of Q1 [March - 2007], the GSM Mobile Service Providers Market share looks like as shown below
Bharti-Airtel is the largest wireless service provider with a market share of 30.63% followed by state owned BSNL controlling 22.53% of the GSM market. Vodafone-Essar is just behind BSNL with 21.77% market share and may very well overtake BSNL to be the second largest GSM service provider in India this quarter. Idea Cellular is lacking the growth which its peers has a market share of 11.53. Reliance GSM has mere market share of 3.3%. While other operators such as Spice Telecom and Aircel are still struggling.
Previous Quarter’s Indian Wireless Subscriber Figures available here. I believe in giving accurate numbers and I had messed Hutch-Essar / Vodafone Essar’s numbers last quarter since I had excluded Fascel [Vodafone Gujarat]. My Bad.
Tags: Mobile India, GSM, Wireless Subscribers, Telecom India
Peek into Bharti Airtel FY07 Results
Just a while ago, Bharti Airtel released its results for FY07 [Ending March-31st]. It has 37 Million Wireless subscribers and 1.87 Million Broadband and Wireline subscribers. I was frantically searching for broadband subscribers. Report says, 32% of Broadband & Wirleline subscribers are also subscribing to Broadband. This tells us that, Airtel has 0.59 Million Broadband subscribers.
Some more insight into the results,
- Wireless Service revenue is up by 72% YoY. Contributes 72% of Total Revenues.
- Broadband & Wirleline services revnue is up by 50% YoY. Contributes 12% of Total Revenues
- Enterprise Services contribute 13% to the topline.
- Wireless Subscribers ARPU stands at Rs 406 / Month with a usage of 475 Minutes / Month
- SMS contributed 6% of total wireless revenues
- Broadband & Wireline segement has ARPU of Rs 1,112 / Month
Wireless will still be the key driver for growth in the next year and bulk of Airtel’s investment (~70%) will be in expanding and enhancing Mobile networks.
Tags: Mobile India, Bharti Airtel, Telecom India, Broadband India
Free Broadband Gimmick on ET
I was surprised to read about Free Broadband for all by 2009. I have asked the authenticity of this release. The government has collected a huge Universal Service Obligation Fund [ A contribution by Private Telecom players to the Government to enable the latter to provide Telecom services in rural areas] The USO chest is estimated to be around $2.1 Billion.
ET writes that this fund will be used to provide Free Broadband which will boost economic activity. LOL. With just $2.1 Billion, you want to provide a Billion Indians with 2 Mbps of Broadband ? I can bet that this will never happen in India, atleast by 2009. I will eat this post if it happens and play the recorded video 
Read about BSNL’s 2 Mbps Broadband / Fraudband gimmick here. The success of Mobile communications in India is impossible to be replicated w.r.t Broadband. Entry costs for Mobile is as low as Rs 1,200 and requires no basic education for the user. To utilize broadband you need a PC and you can make them cheaper if you implement the suggestions of Bill Gates, Governments must supply / subsidize PCs to the needy and he will share his software – Microsoft Suite for mere $3. The government must introduce subsidies on PCs like they do for Cooking Gas and Fertilizers if they want to see that Economic Activity 
Tags: Broadband India, Bill Gates, Free Broadband, Internet India
TRAI notification on National Do Not Call Registry
TRAI just a while ago released[PDF] a final regulation on National Do Not Call registry. This will not be effective immediately because it needs approval from Ministry of IT & Communications and also the RBI.
National Informatics Center, will Design, Develop and Maintain the Do Not Call registry. All tele-marketing companies will have to register with DoT and Ministry of Communications within 3 months of commencement of the registry. Consumers can register their numbers and opt-out to receive any unsolicited calls. Violators are likely to be fined in the range of Rs 500 to Rs 1,000 per call. TRAI does it again in copying the America’s National Do Not Call registry.
Tags: Do Not Call, Do Not Disturb, Telecom India, TeleMarketing
BSNL – Big Business Opportunity in VPN
State owned Telecom major, BSNL sees a big opportunity in offering VPN [Virtual Private Network] services. What is VPN ? It lets your company create a own secured network using public communications infrastructure to let employees work from remote locations. Read more here.
Effective May-1st, BSNL will offer VPN services – Post-paid Dial-Up for MPLS VPN and DSL customers. The tariffs are in addition to existing internet costs. This move by BSNL will let smaller companies offer VPN access to employees which otherwise was a privilege of large companies. Most MNC Tech companies in Bangalore already offer VPN access to its employees enbaling them to WFH [Work From Home]. Don’t worry, your company is billed for it
Tags: Broadband India, BSNL, VPN, Telecom India
Service Providers Hang-Up on Customers
Mobile Service Providers in Karnataka have started disconnecting customers because of TRAI’s regulation on “Subscriber Identity Verification”. Few phones from in my address book are disconnected too. Jeez! they have been using the numbers for past 5-8 years and most have told me that the Telecom companies have misplaced their documents. The internal audit happened and the axe fell on these loyal customers.
Their are few others who are not permanent residents of Bangalore and had used their Passport to get connected but they have been disconnected now. Unlike the West [where we are always copying from], India is still in the 19th century to provide Identity to its citizens. Here is an explanation by TRAI. Good Grief!!!
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