TRAI Report Card May 2016: BSNL Beats All Major Private Operators In Monthly Growth Rate Of Wireless Subscribers

Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has released the latest telecom subscription data as on 31st May 2016. State run telecom major, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) achieved a monthly growth rate of 0.86% beating all major private operators like – Airtel, Vodafone and Idea.

As per the latest report, BSNL added more than 7.54 lakh new mobile customers and thereby increasing its market share from 8.46% to 8.54%. BSNL’s performance in wireless subscriber addition is really encouraging and we may see a clear sign of revival from the improvement in market share itself.

As we reported earlier, the performance of BSNL in wireless subscriber addition and monthly growth rate is continuously increasing from July 2015 on wards – after the launch of FREE All India Roaming Scheme.

BSNL’s Performance in Wireless Subscriber Addition

Month & Year	Net Addition of Wireless Subscribers by BSNL	Monthly Growth Rate of BSNL	Market Share of BSNL
July 2015	4.8 lakhs	0.62%	7.92%
August 2015	8.1 lakhs	1.04%	7.95%
September 2015	10.8 lakhs	1.33%	8.00%
October 2015	7.27 lakhs	0.91%	8.01%
November 2015	9.3 lakhs	1.16%	8.06%
December 2015	11.5 lakhs	1.41%	8.16%
January 2016	9.3 lakhs	1.12%	8.20%
February 2016	13.9 lakhs	1.67%	8.26%
March 2016	15.19 lakhs	1.79%	8.35%
April 2016	11.39 lakhs	1.32%	8.46%
May 2016	7.54 lakhs	0.86%	8.54%

Among BSNL units, all telecom circles achieved positive growth in wireless subscriber addition except Haryana (-1,37,220) Andhra Pradesh (-30,510), Bihar (-15,472) and Madhya Pradesh (-2,405) in May 2016. The best performers are – UP East (+2,04,060), Rajasthan (+1,24,705), Orissa (+1,08,692) Kerala (+1,04,692) and UP West (+97,338).

BSNL holds the No.1 position in Landline segment with 57.69% market share. Airtel holds the No.1 position in Broadband segment (Wired + Wireless) position with 25.54% market share and Vodafone at second position with 19.75% market share as on 31st May 2016.

The total number of telephone subscribers in India declined from 1059.29 million at the end of April 2016 to 1058.03 million at the end of May 2016, thereby showing a monthly growth rate of -0.12%.

Total wireless subscriber base declined from 1034.25 million at the end of April 2016 to 1033.16 million at the end of May 2016, thereby registering a monthly growth rate of -0.11%.

As on 31st May 2016, the private access service providers held 91.11% market share of the wireless subscribers whereas BSNL and MTNL, the two PSUs access service providers, held only 8.89% market share.

The total number of broadband subscribers in India, increased from 151.09 million at the end of Aril 2016 to 159.76 million at the end of May 2016 with monthly growth rate of 5.74%.

Top Five service providers constituted 84.32% market share of total broadband subscribers at the end of May 2016. These service providers were Bharti Airtel (40.80 million), Vodafone (31.55 million), Idea Cellular Ltd (25.70 million), BSNL (20.76 million) and Reliance Communications Group (15.91 million).

In Wired Broadband segment, BSNL holds the No.1 position with 9.89 million customers, followed by Bharati Airtel with 1.79 million customers.

Top Five Wired Broadband Service providers as on 31st May 2016

1.   BSNL (9.89 million)
2.   Bharti Airtel (1.79 million)
3.   MTNL (1.10 million)
4.   Atria Convergence Technologies (0.99 million)
5.   YOU Broadband (0.55 million)

Top Five Wireless Broadband Service providers as on 31st May 2016

1.   Bharti Airtel (39.01 million)
2.   Vodafone (31.54 million)
3.   Idea Cellular (25.69 million)
4.   Reliance Communications (15.79 million)
5.   BSNL (10.87 million)

Mobile Number Portability (MNP)

In the month of May 2016, a total of 5.23 million subscribers submitted their requests for MNP. With this, the cumulative MNP requests increased from 214.04 million at the end of April 2016 to 219.27 million at the end of May 2016.

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