In a Conference Call CEO of Telenor India (Uninor), Mr Yogesh Malik said that India is still an attractive market though they are the 8th operator in India with operations in 6 out of the 22 circles covering half of the Indian Population concentrated in North and the West of India.
Here are the main takeaways from the Call,
Uninor believes they are cheaper than their peers by 25-30% on costs than the largest incumbents in each circle, with total opex being under 19 paise per minute. The company’s overall minutes of usage is 600 minutes, including on-net calls. This is one of the highest in the industry.
They will/are raising prices / ARPMs. However, Uninor will wait to see all operators increase ARPM since they want to be the “Most affordable operator”. Behaviour of industry is a lot more rational, so no one seems to be undercutting on prices.
Consolidation is happening in India a) operators are moving out of non profitable areas either within a circle or totally out; b) Inter-circle roaming – they are sharing networks.
Uninor does not seem to need incremental spectrum from auctions, they are looking at getting incrementally 0.6 MHz from the government moving to 5MHz overall. Their spectrum, as is the spectrum received by all operators in the 2012 auction, is technology agnostic and hence can move to 3G / 4G [But Contiguous Blocks are Necessary and this can be done once Spectrum Trading is facilitated] as and when required. Having said that, the incumbents’ spectrum is not technology agnostic since they are pre 2012 auction.
While concluding he reiterated bullish stance on the Indian Telecommunications Market.