Wireless Federation

TRAI plans legal action against Airtel for violation of MNP guidelines (India)

On 12.16.11, In Mobile, By Editor

Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) is reportedly planning to take action against leading telecom operator Bharti Airtel for violation of norms regarding Mobile Number Portability (MNP). According to reports, the regulatory authority had previously issued a show cause notice to the operator for the same.

As per sources, TRAI has reportedly been receiving complaints from users across different operators for rejecting their request for MNP services, with Bharti Airtel accounting for as many as 893 complaints, the largest number amongst all operators.

Further, reports reveal that TRAI wrote a letter to the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) stating that the regulatory authority had sent a team of officers to various network operators for analyzing the reason behind rejection of MNP requests, and has found that operators have not been complying with the MNP guidelines.

Airtel, Vodafone and Idea threaten to pull out of 3G services (India)

On 11.23.11, In Mobile, By Editor

India’s leading telecom operators Bharti Airtel, Vodafone India and Idea Cellular have reportedly threatened to pull out of 3G services following the government’s proposal to disallow 3G Intra Circle Roaming. According to reports, the firms have written a letter to the Prime Minister expressing their concern over such a decision which has been signed by Sunil Mittal, Chairman and CEO, Bharti Airtel; KM Birla, Chairman, Aditya Birla Group and Vittorio Colao, Group CEO, Vodafone.

As per sources, the firms have said in the letter that by not allowing 3G Intra Circle Roaming, the government would be going back on what was promised during the pre-auction confirmations. Further, the telcos have asked the government to refund the amount spent by them during spectrum action along with interest as compensation for their expenditures.

Reports suggest that while the telecom firms claim that the government is going back on its technology-neutral stand, the Telecom Ministry along with the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) have said that the roaming agreement is illegal as it is equivalent to spectrum sharing.

Sources claim that after the 3G spectrum auction held last year, the operators had entered into roaming pacts with one another in an attempt to offer services in those circles where they could not win the bid. Further, reports also claim that the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) may revoke 3G spectrum of five telecom service providers – Bharti Airtel, Vodafone, Tata Teleservices, Aircel and Idea Cellular, for violation of licence agreement by offering 3G telecom services in states where they do not have spectrum.

Filed under:Mobile Tagged with: 3G • Bharti Airtel • Idea Cellular • India • Intra-Circle Roaming • Trai • Vodafone

Vodafone India may begin IPO process (India)

On 11.17.11, In Mobile, By Editor

Vodafone India may be planning on an Initial Public Offering (IPO) soon as hinted by the operator’s country head, Marten Pieters, in reports. As per sources, Pieters said that they will probably seriously consider it now and start preparations, as a lot needs to be done to go from a private to a public company so that work is on the way which will take time.

Vodafone, the second largest operator in terms of revenue in the country after Bharti Airtel, is hopeful of a more level playing environment in the coming years with weaker operators leaving the market and liberal norms recommended by TRAI for mergers within the industry.

As per sources, Pieters said the company has been spending roughly $1 billion a year in capex along with additional expenses such as 3G licence, costs for additional spectrum and renewal of existing spectrum licences among others. Further, the increasing price wars amongst the various operators to maintain their stronghold in the market has resulted in an industry tariff average of US$ 0.01 per minute and is being considered as one of the most competitive mobile markets in the world.

Filed under:Mobile Tagged with: 3G • Bharti Airtel • India • IPO process • Marten Pieters • Trai • Vodafone India

Bharti Airtel reports highest earnings of $ 2.03 billion in the first quarter (India)

On 11.10.11, In Mobile, By Editor

Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), revealed the earnings for the Indian tele-companies during the first quarter of 2011-12, with Bharti airtel leading the way by accounting for 22 percent of the total revenues of US$ 9.321 billion.

As per TRAI’s India Telecom Services Performance Indicator Report, Airtel had the highest gross revenue at $ 2.03 billion, followed by Vodafone at $ 1.37 billion, Idea Cellular at $ 914.59 million and BSNL at $ 880 million.

The revenues for Reliance Communication, MTNL, Videcon and Quadrant Televentures, showed a decline and were at $ 599.3 million, $ 149.2 million, $ 32.24 million and $ 10.22 million respectively. Further, other telecom operators such as Tata Teleservices reported earnings of $ 569.6 million, followed by Aircel at $ 306.3 million, Unitech at $ 107.1 million, S Tel at $ 7.657 million, Loop telecom at $ 36.98 million and Shyam Sistema at $ 55.47 million.

As per sources, the report also showed that the gross revenue had gone up by 3 per cent from the previous quarter and 13 per cent compared to $ 8.228 billion earned in the same period last year. Further, the adjusted gross revenue (AGR) on which the government charges the license fee grew by 3.56 per cent in the first quarter. As per reports, telecom operators are charges a licence fee based on the category they fall in, such as 10 per cent of AGR in the metros and category ‘A’ areas, 8 per cent in in category ‘B’ areas and, 6 per cent category ‘C’ areas.

Filed under:Mobile Tagged with: Bharti Airtel • Idea • India • telecom operators • Trai • Vodafone

TRAI sets limit of 100 SMS per day (India)

On 09.29.11, In Mobile, By Editor

Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has put a cap on the number of SMS that users can send per day. As per the new regulations, TRAI has prescribed a limit of 100 SMS per day per SIM for all the customers. Currently, telecom service providers offer SMS packages offering as many as 2000 SMS per day. As these can be made use of by unregistered persons for sending commercial communications from ordinary numbers, TRAI has introduced the regulation in order to protect consumers from receiving unwanted messages.

However, transactional messages send by bank and airlines to customers do not fall under this restriction. Further, TRAI also plans to introduce a $0.001 termination charge for every commercial text sent, excluding messages involving transactions. Consumers will have a choice to either completely blacklist the messages or receive commercial SMS as per their preference.

The regulation also requires all telemarketers to register for a phone number with a new 140 prefix. In order to ensure that they do not call consumers on the blacklist, TRAI has set up a fine of up to USD 5,017 per offence for failure to comply.

Filed under:Mobile Tagged with: India • SMS • Trai

New TRAI guidelines upset VAS providers (India)

On 09.19.11, In Mobile services, By Editor

Recent directives by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) on the procedure for providing Value added services (VAS) to users, have turned all VAS providers against the telecom authority as they feel that this would not only harm the industry but could also cause a revenue loss of about $317 million to the government.

In an attempt to protect the interest of the consumers, TRAI had proposed directives in July to service providers on the procedure for providing VAS to users. As per the directive, the service providers need to obtain confirmation from the consumer through SMS, e-mail or in writing within 24-hours of activation of service, and only on receiving such confirmation will the service provider be able to charge the consumer. In the event that the consumer does not respond or sends a negative response, the services will be discontinued.

The service providers on the other hand feel that such directives are not consumer friendly and could hamper the ease with which mobile subscribers currently access their favourite services such as music, sports updates, news reports, video streaming among others.

Filed under:Mobile services Tagged with: India • Trai • VAS

Department of Telecomm cancels 8 telecom licences (India)

On 09.01.11, In Mobile Operators, By Editor

Telecom Regularity Authority of India (TRAI) recommended that 69 licenses should be cancelled owing to failure of telecom operators to meet rollout obligations, of which the Department of Telecomm (DOT) has cancelled only 8 licences. As per reports, only Aircel (two), Dishnet (three), Etisalat (two), and Sistema Shyam (one) were issued show-cause notices for cancellation of licences.

However, sources claim that since the majority of the company’s licenses remain intact, the impact on their business will be negligible. Further, this move will not really affect consumers either as the violation signifies lack of network, and thus subscribers.

Filed under:Mobile Operators Tagged with: Aircel • Dishnet • DoT • Etisalat • India • Sistema-Shyam • Trai

TRAI report finds the actual number of mobile subscribers in India

On 05.04.11, In Mobile, By Editor

According to the highlights of telecom subscription data released by Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, there are 811.59 million wireless subscribers in India. But, the report states that there are only 573.97 million subscribers in the Visitor Location Register (VLR).

VLR is the database that stores information about users that are roaming into a particular network. A user can be present in only one VLR at any given point of time. Thus, this is a better approximation of the number of active users that are currently in the network.

This means 237.62 million subscriptions are dormant rather than active subscribers on the network. Also, many subscribers are using dual-SIM handsets with more than one connection on the same device – which means the actual number of subscribers may be even lower than the 573.97 active subscriptions.

Note: This VLR data excludes the number of CDMA BSNL subscribers as the service provider did not provide the VLR details of their 5.57 million subscribers.

Filed under:Mobile Tagged with: India • Trai

TRAI to come up with new telemarketing guidelines soon (India)

On 03.24.11, In Mobile, By Editor

TRAI has stated that it will soon be announcing new date for implementation of new telemarketing guidelines.

According to Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) Chairman J S Sarma, DoT (Department of Telecom) should be able to take a decision in about 15-days.

TRAI, which was supposed to implement the guidelines by March 21, had postponed it without giving a new date.

According to the telecom watchdog, the implementation is getting delayed as DoT is yet to submit a series of landline numbers to it which will make it difficult for telemarketers to operate from mobile networks.

The new regulation, which calls for restricting unwanted calls and imposition of steep penalties on offenders, was first supposed to be implemented from January 1 this year but has been delayed thrice till now.

Sarma also stated that TRAI will issue a discussion paper on the 4G mobile services in a couple of months. They expect to complete the recommendations made on equipment manufacturing, green telecommunications as well as infrastructure policies by month end after which they will take up 4G. Along with 4G, TRAI will also be holding discussions on other subjects like IUC charges and reforming and liberalization of spectrum.

Filed under:Mobile Tagged with: 4G • Chairman • Department of Telecom • DoT • India • IUC • J S Sarma • Mobile • Telecom Regulatory Authority of India • telecom watchdog • telemarketing guidelines • Trai