The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) recently released the performance indicator report (PIR) for the July-September 2016 quarter. The report highlights the growth trends in the telecom sector for this period. It has been prepared based on the information provided by service providers.
According to the report, the country’s telecom subscriber base (wireless and wireline) increased from 1,059.86 million in end-June 2016 to 1,074.24 million in end-September 2016, registering a growth of 1.36 per cent over the previous quarter. Subscriber growth reflected a year-on-year growth of 5.05 per cent over the same quarter in 2015. The overall teledensity increased from 83.2 per cent as on June 30, 2016 to 84.09 per cent as on September 30, 2016.
Bharti Airtel led the pack with 263.74 million subscribers in its fold as on September 30, 2016. It was followed by Vodafone India (200.84 million) and Idea Cellular (178.82 million). With regard to net additions during the quarter, new entrant Reliance Jio Infocomm Limited (RJIL) recorded the highest addition (15.98 million) followed by Bharti Airtel (4.27 million). However, RJIL’s high net additions were due to the operator commencing services during the July-September 2016 quarter.
Telecom subscription in urban areas increased from 609.45 million as of end-June 2016 to 624.38 million as of end-September 2016, while urban teledensity increased from 153.22 per cent to 156.24 per cent.
The rural telecom subscriber base declined from 450.41 million in June 2016 to 449.86 million in September 2016, resulting in a decrease in rural teledensity from 51.4 per cent to 51.24 per cent. Further, the share of rural subscribers in the total user base decreased from 42.5 per cent in June 2016 to 41.88 per cent in September 2016. Idea Cellular had the highest share of rural subscribers in its user base (54 per cent), followed by Vodafone India (52.98 per cent).
WIRELINE
The country’s wireline subscriber base reduced from 24.74 million to 24.49 million, thereby decreasing the wireline teledensity from 1.94 per cent to 1.92 per cent. The rural subscriber base declined from 4.08 million to 3.92 million, while the urban subscriber base decreased from 20.66 million to 20.57 million.
Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) continued to lead the market with 56.72 per cent share. However, the company’s subscriber base decreased by about 2.17 per cent during the July-September 2016 period and stood at 13.89 million at the end of the quarter. Bharti Airtel recorded the highest net additions (66,000 subscribers) during the period.
The total number of public call offices stood at 508,000 in end-September 2016 as compared to 526,000 in end-June 2016. The number of village public telephones remained the same at 586,774. At the end of the quarter, 98.83 per cent of the 593,731 inhabited villages in the country (as per Census 2001) were connected.
WIRELESS
The total wireless (GSM and CDMA) subscriber base grew by 1.41 per cent, from 1,035.12 million in June 2016 to 1,049.74 million in September 2016. The teledensity increased from 81.26 per cent to 82.17 per cent during July-September 2016. The share of rural subscribers decreased from 43.12 per cent to 42.48 per cent during the quarter under review.
GSM services continued to dominate the wireless market, accounting for 98.38 per cent of the total wireless subscriber base. The GSM subscriber base stood at 1,032.77 million in September 2016 as compared to 996.66 million in June 2016, registering a growth of 3.62 per cent. Meanwhile, the CDMA user base registered a decline of 55.87 per cent, from 38.46 million in June 2016 to 16.97 million in September 2016.
With a subscriber base of 259.94 million, Bharti Airtel had the highest share of 25.17 per cent in the GSM market, followed by Vodafone India with 200.72 million users and Idea Cellular with 178.82 million users.
Among CDMA operators, Tata Teleservices Limited (TTSL) was in the leading position with a subscriber base of 9.4 million and a market share of 55.37 per cent. This was because Reliance Communications (RCOM), which was in the lead in end-June 2016, shut down its CDMA operations during the quarter ended September 2016. TTSL was followed by Sistema Shyam TeleServices Limited and BSNL with 6.72 million and 0.86 million subscribers respectively.
Mobile ARPUs and usage
GSM services
The monthly all-India blended ARPU for GSM players decreased from Rs 126.05 in the quarter ended June 2016 to Rs 120.98 in the quarter ended September 2016. Prepaid ARPUs decreased from Rs 108 to Rs 103, while post-paid ARPUs decreased from Rs 495 to Rs 485.
The overall monthly MoUs per subscriber for GSM services decreased from 377 in the quarter ended June 2016 to 366 in the quarter ended September 2016. The overall ratio of incoming to outgoing MoUs stood at 51.4:48.6. The number of outgoing SMSs per subscriber per month declined from 20 in the quarter ended June 2016 to 19 in the quarter ended September 2016.
CDMA services
The monthly all-India blended ARPUs for CDMA mobile services increased substantially from Rs 98.51 in the quarter ended June 2016 to Rs 154.05 in the quarter ended September 2016. ARPUs for prepaid services increased from Rs 49 to Rs 78 during this period, and ARPUs for post-paid services increased from Rs 474 to Rs 631.
The overall monthly CDMA memorandum of understanding (MoUs) per subscriber increased by 18.08 per cent, from 228 in the quarter ended June 2016 to 269 in the quarter ended September 2016. Prepaid MoUs per subscriber per month increased from 208 to 275. However, post-paid MoUs per subscriber per month decreased from 379 to 232 during the same period.
Quality of service
During the period June-September 2016, the performance of 2G wireless service providers in terms of quality of service (QoS) improved on parameters such as the accumulated downtime of base transceiver stations (BTSs) (not available for service), worst-affected BTSs due to downtime, call set-up success rate (within a licensee’s own network), stand-alone dedicated control channels (SDCCH)/paging channel congestion, metering and billing credibility (post-paid), period of applying credit/ waiver/adjustment to customer’s account from the date of resolution of complaints, percentage of calls answered by operators (voice to voice) within 90 seconds, percentage requests for the termination/closure of service complied with within seven days and time taken for the refund of deposits after closure. On the other hand, the parameters that showed a deterioration in QoS for 2G wireless service providers included worst-affected cells having a traffic channel (TCH) drop (call drop) rate of more than 3 per cent, point-of-interconnection congestion, metering and billing credibility (prepaid), resolution of billing/ charging/validity complaints (98 per cent within four weeks), resolution of billing/ charging/ validity complaints (100 per cent within six weeks) and accessibility of call centre/customer care.
For 3G operators, there was a QoS improvement on several parameters: worst-affected BTSs and Node-Bs due to downtime, SDCCH/paging channel and radio resource control congestion, worst-affected cells having more than 3 per cent TCH drop (call drop) and circuit switched voice drop rate-cell bouncing busy hour and connection with good voice quality and circuit switch voice quality.
INTERNET AND BROADBAND
TRAI has divided the parameters for this segment into two parts – internet subscribers excluding internet access through mobile devices and internet subscribers accessing services through mobile devices.
As of September 2016, the country had 144 internet service providers (ISPs) and 367.48 million internet subscribers, including those accessing the internet through their mobile handsets. The wired internet subscriber base stood at 21.26 million. Bharti Airtel led the internet market with a 25.94 per cent share (an internet subscriber base of 95.31 million in end-September 2016), followed by Vodafone India (69.6 million) and Idea Cellular (54.08 million). The top 10 ISPs together accounted for 97.93 per cent of the subscriber base. The top five states in terms of internet subscriptions (wired and wireless) were Maharashtra (30.62 million), Tamil Nadu (including Chennai) (29.18 million), Andhra Pradesh (27.46 million), Uttar Pradesh (East) (24.5 million) and Karnataka (23.96 million).
Further, as of September 2016, there were 192.3 million broadband subscribers and 175.18 million narrowband subscribers. Wireless (dongle and phone) was the most preferred technology used by service providers to provide broadband services and it accounted for 90.41 per cent of the total broadband subscriber base. The top five states in respect of broadband subscriptions were Tamil Nadu (including Chennai) (19.32 million), Maharashtra (18.13 million), Andhra Pradesh (16.9 million), Karnataka (16.56 million) and Delhi (16.06 million).
Financial performance
During the quarter ended September 2016, the sector’s gross revenue and adjusted gross revenue (AGR) stood at Rs 713.79 billion and Rs 505.39 billion respectively. The gross revenue and AGR increased by 9.82 per cent and 9.26 per cent over the quarter ended September 2015.
