India wireless telephony (January 2011) - Growth continues

Rural market growing faster than urban

• Indian wireless telephony continues to experience robust growth during the month of January 2011. Overall wireless subscriber base touched 771.18 million, 2.52% rise over December 2010.
• Although urban subscriber base share is 66.42% compared with rural share of 33.58%; the rate of growth in rural market is significantly higher. During the month of January 2011, rural wireless subscriber base grew by 3.20% compared with 2.19% growth in urban. Going forward, rural market is expected to grow at faster rate compared with urban market.  
• Rural wireless tele-density of 31.05% compared with urban figure of 143.36% indicates immense growth potential in rural market, while urban market is steadily becoming saturated.  

Active subscriber base figures tells true story 

• As per total subscribers base figures, Bharti leads with 20.20% market share closely followed by Reliance and Vodafone. 
• However, in terms of active subscribers, Bharti leads the competition by significant margin with 26.30% market share as 92.83% of its total subscriber base is active. 
• The other notable player on this parameter is Idea Cellular with 90.34% active subscribers. However, Tata and BSNL suffer due to significantly higher proportion of inactive subscribers on their networks. 
• Overall, 71.14% of the total wireless subscribers in India are active. As a result, actual wireless tele-density of the country is 46% compared with reported figure of 64.74%.This translated into considerable growth opportunity for the future.

As a result we can expect Indian telecom saga is likely to continue in near future.....