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| Wednesday, March 24, 2010 |
| Indian Wireless Subscriber Base 558 Mn |
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Wireless operators reported 18.9m SIM additions in February 2010, down 5% from Jan (19.9m) despite 10% fewer days. Monthly net-adds of Tata Tele (TTSL) continue to ease and were down 30% from Sep-09 peak of 4 million. GSM leaders (Bharti/Voda) reported some up-tick in netadds in Feb (13%/2% mom), while figures reported by RCOM/Idea were practically unchanged vs. January. Notably, new entrants Uninor and S Tel, reported a meaningful mom decline in their net-adds.
TTSL has been the #1 operator by SIM-additions, ever since it launched GSM in late July (2009), but in February, it lost the pole position to Vodafone, which reported 3.1m net-adds vs. TTSL’s 2.8m (and Bharti’s 2.9m). In the five ‘old’ GSM circles (AP, TN, KN, Kerala, Orissa), TTSL’s net-adds are 60% below the Sep-09 levels. However, it is not clear whether this reflects a slowdown in underlying business growth—lower monthly net-adds could also be due to implementation of churn policies.
Its monthly net-adds are up 34% over the last 6 months, which compares well with the 6% uptick reported by Bharti and 40-45% by Vodafone/Idea/Aircel. Nonetheless, we are cautious on RCOM as ARPU/MOU trend for RCOM has been very volatile (mostly disappointing) recently. |
Published on Wednesday, March 24, 2010 at 6:50 PM  |
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| Wednesday, March 03, 2010 |
| Budget Impact - Higher Spectrum Fees |
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The Department of Telecom (DOT) has increased spectrum usage charges (SUC) for GSM players by 1% for spectrum held up to 8.2MHz and by 2% beyond 8.2MHz, effective 1 April 2010. A similar hike has been levied on CDMA players with 7.5MHz as the threshold. The hike in SUC charges will hit companies across the industry.
In addition to the DOT levy of higher SUC, the budget proposal to increase diesel charges by Rs 2.55/ltr to Rs 39/ltr will increase the network operating cost of telecom players, especially in rural areas.
Overall, the government will raise $600 mn / Rs 2800 cr from this higher charge. This is how the Top 5 Wireless Operators will be affected by higher Spectrum Charges
- Bharti Airtel - Rs 100 cr
- Vodafone India - Rs 550 cr
- BSNL + MTNL Rs 375 cr
- Idea Cellular- Rs 307 cr
- Reliance communications - Rs 214 cr
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| Published on Wednesday, March 03, 2010 at 11:26 AM |
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