The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) recently released the performance indicator report for the October-December 2012 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) declined from 937.7 million in September 2012 to 895.51 million in December 2012, registering a drop of 4.5 per cent over the previous quarter. Further, subscriber growth declined by 3.35 per cent over the corresponding quarter in 2011. The overall teledensity declined from 77.04 per cent in September 2012 to 73.34 per cent in December 2012. In terms of circles, Jammu & Kashmir registered a growth of 0.15 per cent in the total subscriber base during the period under review, while all other circles witnessed negative growth.

Bharti Airtel led the pecking order in terms of the overall subscriber base. With regard to net additions during the quarter, only Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited (MTNL) and Quadrant registered positive growth.

The telecom subscriber base in urban areas decreased from 595.69 million in September 2012 to 556.96 million in December 2012, thereby reducing the urban teledensity from 161.13 per cent to 149.9 per cent. Himachal Pradesh registered the highest urban teledensity (336.16 per cent) during the quarter under review, followed by Delhi (220 per cent). Madhya Pradesh reported the lowest teledensity (114.15 per cent), followed by Haryana (116.45 per cent).

The rural telecom subscriber base also decreased from 342.01 million to 338.54 million during this period, which resulted in a drop in the rural teledensity from 40.36 per cent to 39.85 per cent. However, the share of rural subscribers in the total user base increased from 36.47 per cent in September 2012 to 37.8 per cent in December 2012. Idea Cellular had the highest share of rural subscribers (54.39 per cent) in its user base. Himachal Pradesh had the highest rural teledensity (73.08 per cent), followed by Punjab (64.57 per cent). Bihar continued to register the lowest rural teledensity at 26.9 per cent, followed by Madhya Pradesh  at 29.51 per cent.

Wireline

The country’s wireline subscriber base reduced from 31.08 million to 30.79 million during the review period, thereby decreasing the wireline teledensity to 2.52 per cent. The rural subscriber base decreased from 7.1 million  to 6.95 million, while the urban subscriber base dropped by 0.63 per cent.

Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) continued to lead the market with a  68.34 per cent share. However, the company’s subscriber base decreased by about 1.51 per cent during the three-month period and stood at 21.04 million as of December 2012. Tata Teleservices Limited recorded the highest net additions (17,000 subscribers) during the quarter.

The total number of public call offices (PCOs) in the country stood at 1.41 million at the end of December 2012, as compared to 1.55 million at the end of September 2012. The decline in the number of PCOs over the corresponding quarter in 2011 was 40.59 per cent.

However, the number of village public telephones (VPTs) increased to 588,232 in December 2012 from 584,467 in September 2012. Currently, 99.07 per cent of 593,731 inhabited villages in the country (as per the Census 2001) are connected.

Wireless

The total wireless (GSM and CDMA) subscriber base decreased by 4.62 per cent from 906.82 million in September 2012 to 864.72 million in December 2012. The subscriber base decreased by 3.26 per cent over the corresponding quarter in 2011. Moreover, wireless teledensity decreased from 74.49 per cent to 70.82 per cent during the period under review.

The rural wireless subscriber base declined by 0.99 per cent in the quarter ended December 2012 as compared to a 0.47 per cent decrease in the quarter ended September 2012, while urban subscribers declined by 6.75 per cent in the quarter ended December 2012 as compared to a 4.33 per cent drop in the quarter ended September 2012. However, the share of rural subscribers increased from 36.94 per cent to 38.35 per cent during the quarter under review.

GSM services continued to dominate the wireless market, accounting for 91.01 per cent of the total wireless subscriber base. The GSM subscriber base stood at 786.98 million in December 2012 as compared to 808.8 million in September 2012, registering a negative growth of 2.7 per cent. Meanwhile, the CDMA user base decreased by 20.53 per cent from 97.82 million in September 2012 to 77.74 million in December 2012.

With a subscriber base of 181.91 million, Bharti Airtel had the highest share of 23.11 per cent in the wireless market, followed by Vodafone India with 147.48 million users.

Amongst CDMA operators, Reliance Communications maintained its leadership position with a subscriber base of 38.38 million and a market share of 49.37 per cent. With regard to net additions, all operators registered a decline in their user base during the quarter under review.

Mobile ARPUs

GSM services

Market competition took its toll on the ARPUs of GSM operators. The monthly all-India blended ARPU for GSM players increased from Rs 95 in September 2012 to Rs 98 in December 2012.

Prepaid ARPUs increased from Rs 81 in September 2012 to Rs 83 in December 2012, whereas post-paid ARPUs grew from Rs 518 to Rs 527.

CDMA services

The monthly all-India blended ARPUs for CDMA mobile services increased from Rs 77.76 in the quarter ended September 2012 to Rs 79.95 in the quarter ended December 2012. The ARPUs for prepaid services increased from Rs 47.75 to Rs 49.08 during October-December 2012. The ARPUs for post-paid services dropped from Rs 454.37 to Rs 447.72 during this period.

Mobile usage pattern

GSM services

The overall monthly minutes of usage (MoUs) per subscriber for GSM services increased by 4.99 per cent from 342 in the quarter ended September 2012 to 359 in the quarter ended December 2012. Prepaid MoUs increased by 5.21 per cent (from 321 in September 2012 to 338 in December 2012), while post-paid MoUs decreased by 0.68 per cent (960 to 953). The overall ratio of incoming and outgoing MoUs was 52:48. Outgoing SMSs per subscriber per month increased by 6.85 per cent from 36 in September 2012 to 38 in December 2012.

CDMA services

The overall monthly CDMA MoUs per subscriber increased by 2.15 per cent from 225.22 in the quarter ended September 2012 to 230.06 in the quarter ended December 2012. Prepaid and post-paid MoUs increased by 1.78 per cent and 1.31 per cent respectively during October-December 2012. Outgoing SMSs per month declined from 25 to 21 during the period under consideration.

Quality of service

During October-December 2012, the performance of wireless service providers improved with respect to parameters such as the worst affected base transceiver stations (BTSs) due to downtime, traffic channel (TCH) congestion, quality of voice connection, resolution of billing/charging/validity complaints, percentage of calls answered by operators (voice-to-voice) within 60 seconds, call drop rate and the number of worst-affected cells having a TCH drop rate of over 3 per cent.

The performance of wireless service providers deteriorated during the quarter with regard to parameters such as BTSs’ accumulated downtime, metering and billing credibility (for post-paid services), the period of applying credit/waiver/ adjustment to a customer’s account from the date of resolution of complaints, accessibility to the call centre/customer care, percentage of requests for termination/closure of service complied with within seven days and the time taken for the refund of deposits after closure.

Internet and broadband

The number of internet subscribers increased from 24.01 million in September 2012 to 25.33 million in December 2012. Also, 430.6 million wireless data subscribers were added during the quarter under review. BSNL led the market with 51.69 per cent share with an internet subscriber base of 13.09 million at end-December 2012, followed by Reliance Communications Infrastructure Limited (6.23 million) and MTNL (1.94 million).  The 10 leading internet service providers together accounted for 95.42 per cent of the total subscriber base. Maharashtra had the largest internet and broadband base in the country, followed by Tamil Nadu.

The share of broadband in the total internet subscriber base decreased from 61.16 per cent to 59.15 per cent. However, the number of broadband subscribers increased from 14.68 million in the quarter ended September 2012 to 14.98 million in the quarter ended December 2012. The segment witnessed a growth of 12.22 per cent in the quarter ended 2012 over the corresponding period in 2011. DSL was the preferred broadband technology, which was used by over 84.82 per cent of subscribers during October-December 2012. It was followed by the Ethernet local area network (6.09 per cent) and cable modem (5.24 per cent).

The number of narrowband subscribers increased from 9.33 million in September 2012 to 10.35 million in December 2012, registering a growth of 10.59 per cent.

Financial performance

The sector’s gross revenue declined by 0.15 per cent during the quarter ended December 2012. The adjusted gross revenue declined by 2.67 per cent during this period.