The month of March 2018 seems to be one spectacular month for Indian telecom operators especially the top five operators. Starting from BSNL which was able to lure more than 2.5 million new subscribers to its network. Private telcos Vodafone India, Airtel, Idea Cellular and Reliance Jio were able to add more than 32 million subscribers to their basket. Thanks to the diminishing Aircel fortune along with Tata and Telenor buy out.
However, the star of TRAI’s telecom subscription data in the Month of March 2018 is still Reliance Jio. The one disruptive telecom operator is still able to add subscribers on a massive scale. Jio was successful in attracting more than 9.4 million new subscribers to its networks. A major part of this new subscriber addition was possible especially due to the telcos Zero Cost JioPhone.
Stats on Telecom Subscription (March 2018)
- The number of telephone subscribers in India increased to 1,206.22 million.
- The total wireless subscriber which includes GSM, CDMA and LTE subscribers in the country increased to 1,183.41 million.
- Private telecom operators hold 90.55 percent market share in Indian telecom sector. Whereas the two PSU telecom operators BSNL and MTNL market share dips to 9.45 percent.
- Reliance Jio added the maximum number of new subscribers to its network, followed by Idea Cellular, Vodafone India and Airtel and BSNL.
- On the losing side, Aircel topped the chart with more than 4.7 million subscriber loss. Tata, Telenor, RCom and MTNL follows the path.
- Airtel retained the top position in India telecom sector with 25.70 percent market share. Followed by Vodafone India with 18.82 percent market share and Idea Cellular with 17.85 percent market share.
- Reliance Jio’s market share in Indian telecom sector has further raised to 15.76 percent.
- Wireline subscriber base declined to 22.81 million in March 2018. BSNL top’s the wireline segment with 53.78 percent market share, followed by Airtel with 17.24 percent market share.
- Mobile number portability (MNP) requests stood at 19.67 million in March 2018. The highest number of MNP requests till date have been received in Karnataka telecom circle (36.1 million).
Stats on Indian Broadband (March 2018)
- The number of broadband subscribers, which include both mobile and wired subscribers increased to 412.60 million at the end of February 2018.
Majority of this broadband subscribers are from Reliance Jio, thanks to its LTE only network. - Reliance Jio tops the chart in data market in the country with 186.56 million subscribers. Airtel takes the second spot with 85.67 million data subscribers and followed by Vodafone India with 59.77 million data subscribers.
- In wired broadband connections, BSNL tops with 9.30 million subscribers, exactly were it was in February 2018. However, Airtel’s Broadband unit was able to attract new subscribers and now stands with 2.18 million subscribers.
- Again, in the Wireless broadband segment which is based on the number of subscribers, Reliance Jio tops the chart, followed by Airtel and Vodafone India.