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| Tuesday, June 30, 2009 |
| Mobile numbers with "8" as first digit |
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The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) is expected to permit mobile telecom operators to roll out new mobile numbers with ‘8’ as the first digit. The move has been necessitated following a huge spurt in the mobile subscriber base and having used up all mobile numbers beginning with ‘9’.
India’s cellular subscriber base has been growing substantially in the last two years, which led to the exhaustion of the existing sublevels of 9. According to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), India had 415 million cellular subscribers at the end of May 2009, compared to 277 million a year ago.
With the huge surge, DoT had asked telecom players to vacate the 95 level from the landline space for use by mobile operators. This move is expected to make place for 10 crore new numbers, of which DoT will retain 50% as space capacity. |
Published on Tuesday, June 30, 2009 at 2:37 PM  |
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| Friday, June 26, 2009 |
| DoT contemplates separating license + spectrum |
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The Department of telecommunications (DoT) is contemplating to separate the issue of spectrum from license, a move that can help develop a suitable long term policy for the 2G spectrum allocation. DoT came under heavy criticism last year after it issued 2G licenses to a number of new entrants at the same prices that were charged from the now established telecom companies years ago.
As a result, the telecom ministry has been looking for ways to develop a sustainable policy for 2G spectrum allocation. The proposal to separate spectrum from license is a step in this very direction. What it means is that the companies may first have to apply for a telecom licences and then bid for spectrum once they get the license.
Currently, DoT bundles 2G spectrum along with the telecom license, which for a pan-Indian India presence costs Rs 1,651 crore. While the GSM services licence comes bundled with 4.4 MHz of start-up spectrum, a CDMA operator would get 2.2 MHz of the spectrum. Additional spectrum is given to telcos once their subscriber base has reached a critical minimum level.
However, the government has been criticised of this kind of setup and has been advised to follow the international best practice of auctioning the spectrum to discover true price of the scarce resource. Once the government separates the license from the spectrum, it can award new licences and then hold an auction for spectrum. While it will ensure more transparency, revenue of the government will also increase. The DoT has written to the telecom regulatory of authority of India (TRAI) in this regard and sought the opinion of the regulator on separating the license and spectrum. |
| Published on Friday, June 26, 2009 at 2:45 PM |
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| Wednesday, June 17, 2009 |
| DoT postpones 2G spectrum allocation till 3G policy is finalised |
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In a development that is likely to hit telecommunications companies, the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) is understood to have decided to postpone any decision on grant of second generation (2G) spectrum or radio frequency till a final decision on the 3G spectrum allocation is arrived at.
A meeting between the communications minister A Raja and finance minister Pranab Mukherjee on Tuesday ended without a consensus being arrived at and the key issues in the auction of 3G spectrum like the base price and number of players to be accommodated in every circle remain unresolved.
The reason for postponing the 2G auction is that the spectrum panel that was constituted earlier to make suggestions on process of allocating 2G spectrum has recommended that in its report submitted last month that the spectrum should be allocated through internationally accepted auction system. Also, it recommended that the pricing of the spectrum should be market dictated and the base price can be linked with the 3G auction base price.
In this case, it becomes difficult for the DoT to go ahead with any spectrum allocation till the 3G policy is finalised. Also, the telecom ministry, after severe criticism of its 2G spectrum allocation in the previous term of the UPA government, is looking to avoid any further criticism and wants to be clear on the policy front first. However, the development may hit operations of the telcos as additional spectrum is necessary for players to continue providing good quality services to additional subscribers. Although more subscribers can be served with existing spectrum, it takes much more capital expenditure and latest technology to do so and despite that there would be some upper limit to which subscribers can be added with given amount of spectrum.
The move will not only hit existing large players which are waiting for additional spectrum, but also the smaller players and new entrants like Datacom, Unitech and Swan Telecom etc which are awaiting start-up spectrum in many circles. |
| Published on Wednesday, June 17, 2009 at 12:16 PM |
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| Friday, June 12, 2009 |
| GSM Subscriber Net Adds Decline in May |
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GSM operators reported 8.7m (est.) net-adds in May vs. 9.4m in April; our May estimate assumes RCOM added 0.4m subs (same as in April) in its existing GSM (RTL) circles. Decline in overall net-adds was driven by BSNL (net-adds down by 0.6m; 56% mom) and Vodafone (0.2m; 35%). Idea’s net-adds recovered to 1.30m from 1.15m in April (+13%), while Bharti and Aircel reported stable net-adds.
Bharti Airtel's 2.81m net-adds in May were unchanged vs. Mar and Apr, despite the entry of Idea, Aircel and Sistema-Shyam in some of the circles. We note that higher net-adds could be a potential source of surprise, as Bharti's monthly net-adds continue to be significantly higher than our FY10 forecast of 2.3m. At the current run rate of 2.8m per month, Bharti's total sub base would exceed our end-FY10 forecast by 5%.
Idea Cellulars net adds in May improved to 1.3m, after a sharp fall in April to 1.15m (from 1.5m in March) on the back of recovery in two large circles -UP (East) and Bihar. Its net-adds in these circles were under pressure due to competition from new entrants -RCOM (GSM) and Vodafone, respectively. However, Idea's subscriber base in Delhi declined for a second straight month by 31K (48K in Apr), likely because of entry of Aircel (The latter added ~100K subscribers in both the months). Idea entered the Tamilnadu circle in the last week of May
Vodafone India net-adds continue to slide after hitting a peak of 2.86m in March. Over the last 10 months, VOD has expanded its footprint to 23 circles (pan India) from 16. |
| Published on Friday, June 12, 2009 at 6:42 PM |
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| National Security - Rcom disables 36,000 connections in J&K |
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The Anil Ambani Group-led Reliance Communication has deactivated around 36,000 connections in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) due to security threats. The company has started an internal probe into issuance of mobile connections on the basis of fake documents. In J&K , there are more than 20 lakh mobiles connections of BSNL, Airtel, Reliance, Aircel, Vodaphone and Tata Indicom.
The state crime branch has already raided premises of 11 major dealers of Reliance, Vodaphone and Aircel in Srinagar and seized records related to the mobile connections. Further, crime branch officials have also asked mobile companies to conduct internal probes into SIM records, in order to deactivate fake connections.
There over 500 to 600 SIM cards and mobiles connections have been recovered from slain militants and their supporters in the state during last three years according to the police officials. Following the dislcosure, the crime branch has communicated to mobile companies to strictly follow the security guidelines. |
| Published on at 10:30 AM |
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| Monday, June 08, 2009 |
| ANG Auto + TowerWorx join hands Towers solutions in India |
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ANG Auto and TowerWorx USA have joined hands to produce and market Mobile Towers solutions in India. The duo has formed a joint venture (JV) company in the name Towerworx India and each of them will have 50% stake in the new company.
The venture will commence operations in August this year in India and it brings together a lot of synergy in the form of integration of the trailer system with the Telecom Towers. Plus, this alliance brings substantial technological benefit to the mobile telecom companies in terms of multiple carrier capability and rapid deployment capability of the towers versus the standard land line towers being used in the country today.
ANG Auto is an auto component manufacturer in India, having product portfolio such as specialized auto components for heavy commercial vehicles, trailers and trailer parts. It manufactures and exports air-brake components in South East Asia. This apart, ANG Auto also manufactures worms and gear sets, cylinder blocks, clutch collars, brake shoes and S-cam shafts.
TowerWorx is the largest Mobile Tower producer in the USA having a large customer base across the globe like AT&T, T Mobile, Verizon, etc. |
| Published on Monday, June 08, 2009 at 10:42 AM |
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