COAI has released the GSM subscriber base for May and its not surprising to see the additions but at a slower rate. A total of 8.3m subscribers were added to the wireless segment taking the total base to 403.66m.

Airtel again led the pack in April gaining in excess of 2.8m subscribers while Vodafone trailed behind at 2.5m.

On the other hand, government owned BSNL and MTNL saw few additions to the tune 4.5 lakh and 45,553 respectively.

Blyk’s been in the news recently because it plans to enter India. Their announcement of entering the Indian telecom scene is not surprising but its way of functioning is intriguing, which is different than the regular cellular operators. Its works as an MVNO (currently in UK and Netherlands) and offers free talktime and other freebies for viewing ads on the phone. Now one would expect the same MVNO model to be followed here but this is what they said when we contacted them.

Blyk will not work as an MVNO, but as Blyk Media, partnering with mobile operators in all countries where we have presence or will expand to.

We further asked if Blyk will devise some other means for users to earn credits but was returned with “no further details”. They are neither confirming nor denying anything which makes us to do nothing but wait for them to let loose some new details.

Economic Times is reporting that TRAI will be seeking views from stakeholders and experts on the possible tariffs for the MNP service.

We will issue a consultation paper next week on the port and dipping charges of mobile number portability (MNP) service … We will have to see the service is affordable to customers.

Now that they “really” want the service to be affordable to us, we thought of asking the customers directly. So we want to know how much are you willing to pay for such a service. Select your option in the poll below. We really want to know what you think.

PS: If you’re wondering what MNP is all about, read over here.

Do you need a proof to know that Indian telecom is heavily shielded against recession? Month after month, GSM operators have added millions of subscribers and its 8.93 million for the month of April. The report includes major GSM players except Reliance who is said to report the figures separately. The total count now stands at 297.7 million GSM users in India and if we take Reliance into account we may be very close to the iconic 300m landmark.

Another good news is that India’s leading operator, Airtel added 2.81m users during the same tenure taking their subscriber base to 96.74m. Will they cross 100m in May or June? Start your petty bets.

Time for some celebration?! The MNP that was destined to be live last year will finally make its impending release in September. DoT has served a notification which will bring the service into motion on September 20 in Delhi, Mumbai, Maharashtra, Kolkata, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Chennai, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. Rest of the country will get it by March 20, 2010.

One thing which we dreaded since the service announcement was the transaction fee but it seems DoT has come to our rescue. They have given TRAI the authority to fix the price and if the source proves to be correct, it won’t be more than Rs. 300. It looks to be a win-win situation for both, the government and customers too.

Now with the final notice is through, I hope cellular operators pull up their socks and finally reckon ‘Customer is the king’.

Source

PS: We’re back!

This shouldn’t be surprising, right? In an analysis done by TRAI, Airtel has emerged as the most congested GSM network for the period of Oct-Dec. During this period, Airtel had 14 POIs (Point of Intersection) with congestion followed by Vodafone who had 12 and Reliance Communications and Idea with 11 each.

Note: POI signifies the ease with which a customer of one network is able to communicate with a customer of another network. This parameter also reflects as to how effective is the interconnection between two networks. TRAI has set a benchmark of less than 0.5 percent, which means out of 200 calls between two operators, there should be a single call facing a congestion problem.

Rcom seems to be on a roll, with largest number of users added in Jan and Feb compared to any other operator in the country. Last month the count stood at 3.3mn, which is higher than what others managed to rope in. RCom believes that the results are a clear sign of the operators increasing dominance in the Indian Telecom market. 

We Say: Though these figures represent GSM as well as CDMA users, the numbers are expected to increase in the coming months. We are of the view that this is the beginning of RCom’s continuous attempt to strengthen its foothold in the market. 

With the additions done and dealt with, let’s have a look at the market shares and user base of these GSM operators. Here it goes:

• Airtel - 32.88% – 91,114,971
• Vodafone - 23.79% – 65,920,902
• BSNL - 15.94%  - 44,180,880
• Idea - 14.98% – 41,518,613
• Aircel - 6.31% – 17,476,962
• Reliance - 3.88% – 10,744,953
• MTNL - 1.47% – 4,084,579 
• BPL - 0.75% – 2,073,184 

We Say: With Bharti adding the highest number of users to its kitty each month, it is unlikely that it will lose its position. However, Vodafone is trying its level best to reach closer by adding around the same number of users as Airtel. BSNL and Idea also seem to be battling it out for the third position. Though Reliance may seem to be a small player out here, it is adding large number of users each month and we expect to see it climbing up the rankings soon. 

The month of February turned out to be quite positive for Indian Telecom, with GSM operators adding 9.18 mn users in the month. This has taken the total count to 277.11 mn. In percentage terms, the industry clocked a healthy growth rate of 3.43%. 

Getting into specifics, here is how some operators contributed to the figure (additions and growth rate):

•  Airtel: 2.7 mn @ 3.09%
• Vodafone: 2.58 mn @ 4.07%
• BSNL: 1.5mn
• Idea: 1.5mn
• Aircel: 0.7mn @ 4.27%

We Say: Going by the figures, nothing seems to be obstructing the growth of Indian Telecom, making it even more lucrative to more giants. However, we hope to see this growth accompanied by a simultaneous growth/ improvement in the management and service quality. 

The Telecom regulators have come to a decision, which might result in call rates being slashed. The slash is with regards to the termination fee, which operators have to pay each other when users call cross-operator. The fee is an important component of the charges operators charge, thus lowering the overall call rates.

The reduction is expected to reduce call charges by about 20%. However, the ministry will recover this shortfall by an increase in the rates of incoming calls that terminate in India.  The plan will be put into action by the 1st of April.  

We Say: Though the percentage might sound high, it might not result in call rates being reduced substantially. Operators will find some way out to recover this amount, which could be by keeping call rates unchanged.