The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) recently released its performance indicator report (PIR) for the April-June 2015 quarter. The report, pre-pared on the basis of information given by service providers, highlights the growth trends in the sector during this period.
According to the report, India’s telecom subscriber base (wireless and wireline) increased from 996.49 million as of March 31, 2015 to 1,006.96 million as of June 30, 2015, registering a growth of 1.05 per cent over the previous quarter. Meanwhile, the subscriber base reflected a 6.79 per cent year-on-year growth, and the overall teledensity increased from 79.38 per cent as of March 31, 2015 to 79.98 per cent as of June 30, 2015.
Bharti Airtel was in the lead with 234.11 million subscribers as of June 30, 2015, followed by Vodafone India and Idea Cellular with 185.47 million and 162.08 million subscribers respectively. With regard to net subscriber additions during the quarter, Airtel recorded the highest growth with 4.68 million additions, followed by Idea with 4.27 million and Telewings with 2.51 million.
The urban telecom subscriber base increased from 577.18 million as of end-March 2015 to 584.21 million as of end-June 2015. Urban teledensity also increased from 148.61 per cent to 149.7 per cent.
The rural telecom subscriber base grew from 419.13 million to 422.75 million during the same period, leading to an increase in rural teledensity from 48.37 per cent to 48.66 per cent. However, the share of rural subscribers in the total user base declined from 42.08 per cent to 41.98 per cent. Idea Cellular had the highest share of rural subscribers in its user base (57.21 per cent), followed by Vodafone India (53.52 per cent).
Wireline
India’s wireline subscriber base reduced from 26.59 million to 26.15 million during the period under review, thereby decreasing wireline teledensity from 2.12 per cent to 2.08 per cent. The rural wireline subscriber base declined from 5.12 million to 4.9 million, while the urban subscriber base decreased from 21.47 million to 21.25 million.
Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited continued to lead the market with a 60.94 per cent share. However, its subscriber base decreased by about 3 per cent during April-June 2015 to stand at 15.94 million at the end of the quarter. Bharti Airtel recorded the highest net additions (33,000 subscribers) during this period.
The total number of public call offices (PCOs) in the country stood at 702,000 as of end-June 2015, compared to 737,000 as of end-March 2015. The number of PCOs registered a year-on-year decline of 23.09 per cent when compared to June 2014.
The number of village public telephones (VPTs) increased from 585,981 as of end-March 2015 to 587,280 as of end-June 2015. At the end of the quarter, 98.91 per cent of the country’s 593,731 inhabited villages (as per the 2001 census) were connected.
Wireless
The total wireless (GSM and CDMA) subscriber base grew by 1.13 per cent, going from 969.89 million as of end-March 2015 to 980.81 million as of end-June 2015. The teledensity increased from 77.27 per cent to 77.9 per cent.
The rural subscriber base grew by a mere 0.89 per cent during the quarter ended June 2015, as compared to 5.3 per cent during the quarter ended March 2015, while the urban subscriber base increased by 4.72 per cent as against 4.31 per cent in the previous quarter. Meanwhile, the share of rural subscribers in the total subscriber base declined from 42.7 per cent to 42.6 per cent during the quarter under review.
GSM services continued to dominate the wireless market, accounting for 94.91 per cent of the total wireless subscribers. The GSM subscriber base stood at 930.92 million as of June 30, 2015 as against 917.73 million as of March 31, 2015, registering a quarterly growth of 1.44 per cent. Meanwhile, the CDMA user base registered a decline of 4.36 per cent, going from 52.16 million at the end of March 2015 to 49.89 million at the end of June 2015.
With a subscriber base of 230.66 million, Bharti Airtel had the highest share of 24.78 per cent in the GSM market, followed by Vodafone India with 185.38 million users and Idea Cellular with 162.08 million users.
Among CDMA operators, Reliance Com-munications maintained its leadership position with a subscriber base of 26.82 million and a market share of 53.75 per cent. It was followed by Tata Teleservices Limited and Sistema Shyam TeleServices Limited with 12.92 million and 8.7 million subscribers respectively.
Mobile ARPUs and usage
GSM services
The monthly all-India blended ARPU for GSM players increased from Rs 121 in the quarter ended March 2015 to Rs 126 in the quarter ended June 2015. Prepaid ARPUs increased from Rs 105 to Rs 109, while post-paid ARPUs increased from Rs 474 to Rs 501.
The overall monthly minutes of usage (MoUs) per subscriber for GSM services stood at Rs 388 in the quarter ended June 2015, about 1.3 per cent higher than the Rs 383 registered during the quarter ended March 2015. The number of out-going SMSs per subscriber per month decreased from 24 during the quarter ended March 2015 to 22 during the quarter ended June 2015.
CDMA services
The monthly all-India blended ARPU for CDMA mobile services decreased from Rs 108 in the quarter ended March 2015 to Rs 107 in the quarter ended June 2015. ARPUs for prepaid services decreased from Rs 58.46 to Rs 55.79 during this period, while post-paid ARPUs increased from Rs 501 to Rs 506.42.
The overall monthly CDMA MoUs per subscriber decreased by 0.8 per cent from 265 in the quarter ended March 2015 to 263 during the quarter ended June 2015.
Outgoing MoUs increased by 0.3 per cent and incoming MoUs decreased by 2.12 per cent during April-June 2015. Prepaid MoUs per subscriber per month decreased by 0.82 per cent while post-paid MoUs per subscriber per month decreased by 1.23 per cent during the same period.
Quality of service
During April-June 2015, the performance of 2G wireless service providers in 
terms of quality of service (QoS) improved on parameters like call set-up success rates (within the licensee’s own network), congestion in stand-alone dedicated control channels/paging channels, resolution of billing/ charging/credit/validity complaints (98 per cent within four weeks), accessibility to call centres/customer care, the percentage of calls answered by operators (voice-to-voice) within 90 seconds, and the time taken to refund deposits after closures.
On the other hand, the performance of 2G wireless service providers deteriorated on account of traffic channel congestion, worst-affected cells with a call drop rate of more than 3 per cent, voice quality, point- of-interconnection (PoI) congestion (the number of PoIs not meeting the benchmark), metering and billing credibility (post-paid as well as prepaid), period of applying for credits/waivers/adjustments to customer accounts from the date of complaint resolution, and the percentage of requests for the termination/closure of service complied with within seven days.
Meanwhile, 3G operators showed an improved QoS owing to set-up success rates (within the licensee’s own network), voice quality and circuit switched voice quality, and PoI congestion. On the other hand, the parameters that were affected by deterioration in QoS included base transceiver station (BTS) and Node B accumulated downtime, worst-affected BTSs and Node Bs due to downtime and call drops, and circuit switched voice drop rates.
Internet and broadband
TRAI has divided this segment into two parts – internet subscribers excluding those accessing services through mobile devices, and internet subscribers accessing services through mobile devices.
As of end-June 2015, India had 319.42 million internet subscribers, including those accessing the internet through mobile handsets. The wired internet subscriber base stood at 19.21 million.
Bharti Airtel led the internet market with a 25.86 per cent share (82.59 million subscribers), followed by Vodafone India (66.83 million) and Idea Cellular (37.17 million). The top 10 internet service providers together accounted for 98.16 per cent of the subscriber base. The top five circles in terms of internet subscribers (wired and wireless) were Maharashtra (26.58 million), Tamil Nadu including Chennai (26.11 million), Andhra Pradesh (23.41 million), Uttar Pradesh (East) (21.91 million) and Karnataka (20.98 million).
As of June 2015, there were 108.85 million broadband subscribers and 210.57 million narrowband subscribers. Wireless (dongle and phone) was the most preferred technology of operators for providing broadband services, constituting 85.16 per cent of the total broadband subscriber base. The top five circles in terms of broadband subscribers were Tamil Nadu, including Chennai (11.07 million), Delhi (10.07 million), Maharashtra (9.96 million), Karnataka (9.09 million) and Andhra Pradesh (8.36 million).
Financial performance
During the quarter ended June 2015, the sector’s gross revenue and adjusted gross revenue stood at Rs 650.3 billion and Rs 471.34 billion, respectively, increasing by 3.36 per cent and 7.49 per cent, respectively, over the quarter ended June 2014.
