Telecom firms lose heavily in Gujarat. Dailybaskar.com

Telecom firms lose 4.56 lakh mobile subscribers in a month in Gujarat

Himansh Dhomse, DNA | Sep 27, 2012, 04:56AM IST

Ahmedabad: For the second consecutive month, the number of mobile connections in Gujarat continued to fall. It was for the first time since May 1997 that  telecom companies lost customers in July 2012.

There was a drop of 12.26 lakh in mobile connections in July 2012, while 4.56 connections were down in August. As per the subscription figures released by the telecom industry apex bodies — Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) and Auspi, the net additions in mobile subscription for August in Gujarat remains negative.

However, the total number of mobile connections in Gujarat remains around 5.30 crore with around 80% of active users.

Idea Cellular, Videocon, Reliance Communications and Tata Teleservices have witnessed a continuing fall for the second consecutive month. Idea tops the list among  losers with 1.51 lakh connections.

Interestingly, Bharti Airtel which was the largest gainer in July with 58,000 new connections lost 1.35 lakh in August and become the second largest loser of the month. Videocon which has been losing customer base in Gujarat for a year now has lost more than 3.72 lakh connections since May 2012. In August, with loss of 1.02 lakh connections, the total subscription of Videocon fell below seven digit for first time in two years.

Reliance Communication, which announced 25% hike in call rates last week, has continued the trend of discontinuing the inactive users. Even in August, Reliance has seen fall of 8,400 connections. Tata Teleservices, which is also CDMA and GSM operator like Reliance, has lost 38,894 customers. Aircel witnessed fall of 20,000 connections in August in Gujarat.

Telecom companies have shifted their focus from subscription numbers to revenues. Confirming the effect of slowdown, Brajesh Bajpai, business head of the Gujarat circle for Vodafone informed in a recent meeting that August figures were worse than the previous month. “Several telecom operators have seen a dip in the numbers.

However, we have stopped focusing on numbers, as we are more interested in offering quality services instead of simply adding more subscribers,” he said. Vodafone added 25,000 connections in August in Gujarat. Officials of other telecom companies were not willing to comment on the issue.

Nationally, the members of COAI, witnessed net fall of 71.05 lakh connections in August. Of the total nine GSM operator members of COAI, six have lost connections. Bharti Airtel lost 19.02 lakh connections, Vodafone (15.59 lakh), Idea Cellular (16.46 lakh), Uninor (23.83 lakh), Videocon (3.83 lakh) and MTNL lost 1.03 lakh connections in August.