NFTE BSNL THANJAVUR SSA

GSM net additions weak due to decline in subscribers in J&K

Indian GSM telecom operators added 11.5 million new subscribers in the month of July, taking the all India GSM cellular subscriber base to 468.10 million, according to the Cellular Operators' Association of India (COAI).

Figures released by COAI show that GSM net additions fell by 6 per cent month on month (MoM) in July. GSM players added 11.5 subscribers in July, which is 10.6 per cent below net additions in June. This was mainly due to a drop in subscriber numbers in J&K, according to research report of Religare Capital Markets.
Manoj Singla from Religare said, "Most incumbents, including Bharti, Vodafone and Idea showed a decline in net subscriber additions. Subscriber net additions have come off the 13-14 million per month to 11-12 million per month over the past few months, which may suggest that the dual SIM trend is weakening as tariff wars come off and is a reflection of peaking competitive intensity in the market.”
He added, “As such, this also indicates that more of the incremental subscribers may be quality customers, and may be an indication for better than expected ARPU performance by the telcos in the last quarter."
Bharti has been losing subscribers as well. Its net additions were 2.6 million, down 13 per cent month on month, mainly due to a decline in about 170,000 subscribers in J&K, said Singal.
A similar sort of decline was also seen amongst most incumbents, with Vodafone seeing net additions decline by 11 per cent MoM, and Idea’s net additions declining by 14 per cent MoM. BSNL and Aircel showed a growth of 7 per cent and 1 per cent MoM in net additions respectively. Geographically, J&K saw a drop in subscribers, from 5.2 million in June to 4.3 million in July.
Rumit Dugar, Religare Capital Markets, said, "New entrants had a mixed bag as far as addition of subscriber base is concerned. Uninor showed net additions of 850,000, down 16 per cent MoM, while Videocon showed net adds of 835,000 up 52 per cent MoM."
He added that the new entrants have continued to see limited traction and have failed to keep net additions above one million per month on a consistent basis.