The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) recently released the performance indicator report for the January-March 2009 quarter. The report presents the growth trends for various telecom services and the performance of companies during the quarter. The total subscriber base (mobile plus fixed line users) increased by 11.68 per cent from 384.79 million as of December 2008 to 429.72 million as of March 2009. Overall teledensity increased from 33.23 per cent to 36.98 per cent.

Fixed line services
In contrast to the long-standing trend of declining fixed line subscriber bases, the January-March 2009 quarter witnessed a marginal increase from 37.9 million, in December 2008 to 37.96 million. The rural wireline subscriber base on the other hand, witnessed a marginal decline and stood at 10.58 million as of end-March 2009 compared to 10.68 million in the quarter ended December 2008.

Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) continued to dominate the fixed line market with a 77.4 per cent market share in spite of facing a marginal decline in its subscriber base from 29.5 million as of December 2008 to 29.34 million at the end of March 2009.

Wireless services
 The wireless subscriber base registered a 12.93 per cent increase and reached 391.76 million in March 2009 as against 346.89 million in December 2008.

GSM services continued to dominate the wireless market with a subscriber base of 297.26 million in March 2009, accounting for 75.88 per cent of the total wireless subscriber market. CDMA services, with a market share of 24.12 per cent, had a total of 94.5 million subscribers at the end of March 2009.

Bharti Airtel maintained its position as the country’s largest mobile operator with a subscriber base of 93.92 million as of March 2009, witnessing a growth of 9.66 per cent over the previous quarter. Amongst CDMA service providers, Reliance Communications dominated the market with a subscriber base of 52.65 million as of March 2009.

Mobile ARPU
For the first time, the average revenue per user (ARPU) for CDMA operators fell below the Rs 100 mark. It decreased from Rs 111 in the quarter ended December 2008 to Rs 99 in the quarter ended March 2009. GSM ARPUs also hit an all-time low declining by 6.5 per cent to touch Rs 205 for the quarter ended March 2009.

Mobile usage pattern
 The minutes of usage (MoUs) per subscriber continued to show a declining trend. GSM MoUs witnessed a 2.43 per cent decline from 496 minutes in December 2008 to 484 minutes in March 2009. The usage pattern for CDMA subscribers also witnessed a declining trend with the total MoUs per subscriber per month falling from 371 minutes to 357 minutes.

Internet and broadband services
 There were 13.54 million internet subscribers at the end of March 2009 as compared to 12.85 million as of December 2008, a growth of 5.3 per cent. Amongst the 167 internet service providers, BSNL retained its top position with a market share of 53.61 per cent and a subscriber base of 7.26 million, as against 6.7 million subscribers at the end of the previous quarter. The number of broadband subscribers stood at 6.22 million at the end of March 2009 as compared to 5.52 million at the end of December 2008, marking a growth of 12.68 per cent.

The number of leased line connections stood at 24,883 at the end of March 2009 as compared to 24,203 at the end of December 2008, registering an increase of 2.18 per cent.

Internet MoU/ARPU
 The average MoU per subscriber per month for dial-up subscribers was 226.58 minutes during the day (between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m.) and 101 minutes at night (between 8 p.m. and 8 a.m.), at the end of March 2009. The ARPU was Rs 236.47 as compared to Rs 221.97 at the end of the previous quarter, marking an increase of 6.53 per cent.

VSAT services
 As of March 2009, there were nine operators providing very small aperture terminal (VSAT) services in India. There was an addition of 7,205 new VSAT users to reach 102,240 subscribers in March 2009, a growth of 7.58 per cent as against the growth rate of 0.63 per cent in the previous quarter. Hughes Communications continued to lead the market with a subscriber base of 30,011, while Tatanet Services registered the highest growth rate of 60.82 per cent in the quarter.