Category: Broadband

Broadband subs growth slows further, wireline broadband loses subs

BENGALURU: The growth of broadband subscribers has been slowing over the past few months. Telecom Regulatory Authority of India data for the month of May 2017 (as on 31 May 2017) indicates that wireless internet subscribers increased by just 0.22 percent in May-17 to 272.85 million from 265.43 million in April 2017. Top five broadband internet service providers constituted 88.23 percent market share of the total broadband subscribers at the end of May-17. These service providers were Reliance JioInfocom Ltd (117.34 million), Bharti Airtel (53.30 million), Vodafone (40.43 million), Idea Cellular (24.63 million) and BSNL (21.59 million).

As on 31 May, 2017, the top five Wireless Broadband Service providers were Reliance JioInfocomm Ltd or Jio (117.34 million), Bharti Airtel (51.21 million), Vodafone (40.42 million), Idea Cellular (24.63 million) and Reliance Communications (14.46 million). Month-on-Month (MoM) growth in May-17 as compared to April-17 was:

Please refer to the figures below:

Overall growth of mobile broadband subscribers in May-17 with respect to April-17 was: 3.12 percent; Jiogrew by 4.2 percent; Airtel grew by 2.07 percent; Vodafone by 1.69 percent; Idea Cellular by 2.24 percent and Reliance Communications grew by 3.29 percent. The upside of the growth numbers was that both Idea Cellular and Reliance Communications witnessed positive subscriber growth in May-17 as opposed to de-growth in the previous month (April-17) as compared to March-17.

In the meantime, wired broadband internet subscribers declined 0.11 percent in May-17 to 18.23 million from 18.25 million in April-17. As on 31 May, 2017, the top five Wired Broadband Service providers were BSNL (9.80 million), Bharti Airtel (2.09 million), Atria Convergence Technologies (1.20 million), MTNL (0.99 million) and You Broadband (0.64 million). Among the top 5 wired broadband internet service providers the government run providers – Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) and Mahanagar Telecom Nigam Limited (MTNL) lost subscribers, Airtel saw no change, while the minnows ACT and You Broadband both gained subscribers in May17 as compared to April 17

In CY-17 until May-17, ACT has added the largest number of wired internet subscribers at 80,000, followed by Airtel with 50,000 additions. You BB added 40,000 subscribers, while BSNL lost 150,000 and MTNL lost 50,000 subscribers during the same period.

Notes: (1) The Indian numbering system or the Vedic numbering system has been used at some places in this paper/charts to denote numerical values. The basic conversion to the international norm would be:
(a) 100,00,000 = 100 lakh = 10,000,000 = 10 million = 1 crore.
(b) 10,000 lakh = 100 crore = 1 arab = 1 billion.

(2) TRAI reports indicate data in millions of numbers up to 2 decimal places. Hence it is assumed in this report that a figure of 0.51 million (5.1 lakh) subscribers for You BB for Dec-2015 would be granular to the nearest 10,000. While percentages have been mentioned up to two decimal places, the accuracy may vary, depending upon the exact number.
(3) MSOs’ have a number of subsidiaries and alliances, hence broadband numbers are split as applicable. The consolidated subscription numbers of these entities could be larger. Hathway is a case in point.

July 17, 2017
Spectranet ranked as fastest FTTH for June 2017

Spectranet, India’s first 100% fibre broadband service provider today announced that it has been ranked as the fastest FTTH provider by Netflix. They have been ranked number 2 in the overall ISP rankings basis their primetime performance on Netflix, world’s leading internet television network with over 83 million members in over 190 countries.

Spectranet is ranked number 2 for its superior service provided through its cutting-edge fibre network that delivers speeds of 100 Mbps and beyond and offers truly unlimited downloads & uploads without any speed capping.

Courtesy: Netflix

On this feat, Mr Udit Mehrotra, CEO, Spectranet said, “As we are trending upwards every month since the inception of this ranking in India, we are proud to be the fastest FFTH provider in the ranking and we are looking forward to attain the fastest ISP ranking in the near future. We have already been the fastest fibre based internet service provider basis our performance in the month of September to December 2016. This has been made possible by our sustained efforts to deliver innovative and disruptive services to our customers at amazingly affordable price. Being the only ISP with 100% fibre network we believe that we can advance the lives of people in urban India by creating and delivering the best internet services which has become a basic necessity for people in this era of Third Age of Connectivity’.

About Netflix survey:

Netflix ranks performances of prominent ISPs across the globe for their ‘Prime Time Netflix performance’ and the ratings for ISPs in India were introduced first in the month of May 16. Netflix introduced ‘fast.com’ to provide quick and simple way for any internet user to test their current internet speed.

About Spectranet

Spectranet is an innovative and disruptive technology company dedicatedly working to deliver joy, advantage and success for people through and by, the continuous pursuit of excellence in Internet services. It is India’s only end to end pure optical fibre network enabled Internet service provider, capable of delivering speeds of 1 Gbps for home & 10 Gbps for business customers. With headquarters in Gurgaon, its fibre network presence is currently spread across eight major cities. For further information, please visit http://www.spectranet.in/

July 13, 2017
Fortinet deploys over 500 WiFi locations across Mumbai

MUMBAI: Fortinet, a leader in high-performance cybersecurity solutions, has announced that the Maharashtra Information Technology Corporation (MITC) has selected Fortinet to provide wireless Internet access to the citizens of Mumbai, India.

Fortinet’s access points provide WiFi Internet access for the public in Mumbai and are deployed in more than 500 locations across the city for the Mumbai WiFi project. The WiFi network is also planned to be used for smart transportation in the near future. This deployment is part of the state government’s digital empowerment program, and Fortinet beat several other enterprise wireless providers to win the deal. Fortinet is uniquely able to support the technical implementation of this project with its wireless R&D center in Bangalore.

In the first phase of the Mumbai WiFi project, the Maharashtra Government has deployed a combination of Fortinet indoor and outdoor access points with omnidirectional antennas, wireless controllers, and a wireless manager to provide simplified deployment and scaling, voice mobility, and the high performance needs required.

Digital Empowerment of Mumbai

Mumbai is home to 20.5 million people and is the commercial capital and the largest city in India. The Government of Maharashtra launched the Mumbai WiFi project to cover all major areas in the city with public WiFi hotspots to ensure that government services are available online to its citizens. Later this year, the WiFi network will also be used for smart parking and smart transportation, by providing real-time updates on the routes and available capacity of various modes of public transport in the city. The introduction of WiFi hotspots in Mumbai expands on the government’s vision of making Maharashtra the country’s first digital state.

Fortinet Secure Access Solution

Securing public communications over WiFi, such as personal information, financial transactions, and mobile device data sharing, involves much more than simply managing network access control. As organizations change the way they deploy access networks, connect devices, and the number and types of network-connected wireless devices and mobile applications grows exponentially, IT leaders must deal with the difficult task of balancing the requirements of network security with the flexibility to onboard a growing number and diversity of clients.

Users want fast WiFi and a smooth experience across wired or wireless networks and IT leaders need reduced complexity of network management, application management, and device management. Typical WiFi solutions cannot satisfactorily address these requirements. Fortinet’s Secure Access solution delivers three WLAN deployment options to meet the different WLAN requirements of today’s enterprises. In addition to WLAN services, our complete secure access portfolio also provides the most flexible security with end-to-end enforcement enabled by the Fortinet Security Fabric.

Maharashtra’s principal secretary – information technology Vijay Kumar Gautam says: “With the Mumbai WiFi project, our goal was to cover all major areas in the city with public WiFi in order to make important government services available online. Because of the hyper-connected nature of our public infrastructure today, an ambitious project like this requires technology that can scale and be flexible to enable more users, devices, and applications over time.”

Fortinet SVP – products and solutions John Maddison says: “BYOD and the Internet of Things (IoT) are creating new attack vectors that put critical assets within public or private networks at risk. As more users, devices, and applications are added to WiFi networks, organizations need secure, enterprise-class WiFi that can deliver a superior experience for all users. Secure access needs to extend consistent security policies to the very edge of the network where most vulnerabilities target. Security cannot happen at the expense of high-availability, speed and density of coverage which are all must-haves in a public WiFi network.”

July 7, 2017
Jio launches 25k-km 100Gbps submarine cable system

MUMBAI: Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd. (Jio), the largest 4G and mobile broadband digital services provider in India, has announced the launch of the Asia-Africa-Europe (AAE-1) submarine cable system.

AAE-1, the longest 100Gbps technology based submarine system, will stretch over 25,000 km from Marseille, France to Hong Kong, with 21 cable landings across Asia and Europe. This large scale project is the combined work of leading telecom service providers from Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. With diversified Points of Presence

(PoP) in Asia (Hong Kong and Singapore) and three onward connectivity options in Europe (via France, Italy and Greece), AAE-1 will provide the requisite flexibility and diversity for carriers and their customers.

AAE-1 will pass through the critical hubs, serving the increasing demand for video centric data bandwidth supporting all types of communications, applications, and content within India and beyond. AAE-1 links seamlessly with other cable systems and fiber networks to deliver direct access to all global markets.

“The new terabit capacity and 100Gbps direct connectivity to global content hubs and interconnection points ensure that Jio will continue to offer its customers the most exceptional high speed internet and digital service experience,” said Jio president Mathew Oommen.

“We are excited to participate in the launch and deliver the cable landing in Mumbai at the time when India’s data traffic continues its accelerated data consumption and growth.”

Due to its advanced design and route, AAE-1 provides one of the lowest latency routes between Hong Kong, India, Middle East and Europe with the fewest hops.

Jio provides the Network Operations & Management for AAE-1 Cable System. The AAE-1 NOC, managed by Jio, leverages the state of the art facility in Navi Mumbai along-with its advanced tools and automation.

June 30, 2017
ACT still leads in wired sub addition, Idea & BSNL lose wireless subs

BENGALURU: Atria Convergence Technologies Pvt. Ltd (ACT) continued to lead in wired broadband internet subscribers additions in calendar year 2017 (CY-17) until 30April 2017 (Apr-17) as per data released by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI). ACT added 70,000 subscribers, of which 20,000 were added inApril 2017 followed by Indian telecom major Bharti Airtel Limited (Airtel) and You Broadband which added 10,000 subscribers each during the same period.

The MukeshDhirubhaiAmbani led Reliance Industries Limited juggernaut Reliance JioInfocom Limited (Jio) continued as the company with the largest wireless broadband internet subscriber base in the country – all of it being wireless so far. Having overtaken the incumbent biggest wireless broad band internet player until Oct-16, Airtel, Jio had a subscriber base of 112.55 million (1125.5 lakh) in Apr-17. Its peers in the wireless internet space – Idea and BSNLbled subscribers. Idea Cellular lost 2.95 million (29.5 lakh) subscribers in the month of April 2017, while BSNL lost 1.22 million (12.2 lakh) subscribers during the same period.

1.1 lakh (0.11 million) wired broadband internet subscribers were added in CY-17 as per TRAI data. Among the wireline ISP’s,BSNL is the biggest player by far with 99.7 lakh subscribers. BSNL lost 10,000 wired broadband subscribers in CY-17.The second largest wireline ISP in India is Airtel, which closed Apr-17 with 20.9 lakh wireline subscribers, after adding just 10,000 subscribers to its wireline internet subscriber base during Apr-17 and 50,000 in CY-17. The third largest wireline broadband internet services provider was regional private player ACT Broadband with a subscriber base of 11.9 lakh at the end of Apr-18. The government run Mahanagar Sanchar Nigam Limited (MTNL) lost 40,000 subscribers in CY-17 and had a subscriber base of 10 lakh at the end of Apr-17. The fifth player in the list of top five wireline broadband internet service providers in the country is another regional player – You Broadband or You BB. The minnow’s subscriber base grew by 10,000 to 0.63 million (6.3 lakh) in Apr-17 vis-à-vis Mar-17. Please refer to the figure below:

The wireless broadband internet subscriber basein India in CY-17 grew 22.12 percent (48.07 million) from 217.36million to 265.43million in Apr-17. It was 251.71 million in Mar-17. During the same period, the wireless broadband subscriber base of the top five service providers grew by 52.09 million, indicating in general that though the overall wireless subscriber base grew, a number of subscribers switched loyalties and moved to 4 of the 5 top players – (Idea Cellular has lost subscribers, the other 4 players have gained in CY-2017).

The top five service wireless internet service providers subscriber base grew 3.44 percent (52.9 million) between Mar-17 and Apr-17. The top five wireless service providers constituted 88.04 percent market share (87.48 percent in Mar-17) of the total broadband subscribers at the end of Apr-17. These service providers were Jio(112.55 million), Airtel (52.25 million), Vodafone (39.76 million), Idea Cellular (24.09 million) and BSNL (21.58 million).

Please refer to the figure below for subscriber base of top 5 wireless broadband internet service providers:

Among the top 5 wireless broadband internet services providers in the country, Jio has shown the highest growth. Please refer to the figure below for growth of top 5 wireless broadband internet service providers in the country:

Notes: (1) The Indian numbering system or the Vedic numbering system has been used at some places in this paper/charts to denote numerical values. The basic conversion to the international norm would be:
(a) 100,00,000 = 100 lakh = 10,000,000 = 10 million = 1 crore.
(b) 10,000 lakh = 100 crore = 1 arab = 1 billion.

(2) TRAI reports indicate data in millions of numbers up to 2 decimal places. Hence it is assumed in this report that a figure of 0.51 million (5.1 lakh) subscribers for You BB for Dec-2015 would be granular to the nearest 10,000. While percentages have been mentioned up to two decimal places, the accuracy may vary, depending upon the exact number.
(3) MSOs’ have a number of subsidiaries and alliances, hence broadband numbers are split as applicable. The consolidated subscription numbers of these entities could be larger. Hathway is a case in point.

June 15, 2017
Speedy b’band: IOX & Alcatel to build first open cable connecting Mauritius & Rodrigues to S Africa & India

MUMBAI: Spanning more than 8850 km, c will provide Mauritius with route diversity and connect Rodrigues for the first time to a submarine cable, enhancing ultra-high speed broadband services.

A new submarine cable system, IOX Cable System, spanning more than 8850 kilometers, will enhance communications capabilities along the India to South Africa route, providing the first open cable in Mauritius and connecting for the first time the island of Rodrigues.

IOX Cable Ltd – a Mauritius-based company – and Alcatel Submarine Networks (ASN), part of Nokia, have signed a turnkey agreement for the deployment of the IOX Cable System, which will increase the availability of ultra-high speed broadband services, and reinforce Mauritius as a communication hub in sub-Saharian Africa.

The IOX Cable System will stretch from Mauritius to Rodrigues, to the east coast of South Africa and then on to the east coast of India. Providing an ultimate design capacity of over 13 terabits-per second per fiber pair, the system will allow easy connectivity to current and future undersea cables on the east and west coast of Africa, delivering a gateway to the continent and a new alternate route between Asia and Africa.

The system’s deployment will support ultra-fast data transmission to address the growth of digital communications and cloud computing requirements, enabling IOX to offer differentiated services, while strengthening service, reliability and redundancy to existing cables.

Arunachalam Kandasamy, Founder and CEO of IOX Cable Ltd said: “IOX is committed to delivering its end-users with advanced infrastructures that incorporate technology innovations. Leveraging ASN’s state-of-the-art technologies we will be able to continue to support and drive broadband infrastructure development based on new socio-economic models centered around the new digital economy.”

Philippe Piron, President of Alcatel Submarine Networks said: “We are proud to support IOX in this project, one which will be a step-change in capacity for Maurititus and Rodrigues. ASN is confident that the bandwidth, resilience and traffic routing of the IOX Cable System, combined with our technology capabilities, will enable us to address the fast-evolving expectations and demands of end-users.”

The IOX Cable System will integrate ASN’s latest innovations in subsea communications, including the 1620 SOFTNODE and ROADM branching unit offering dynamic features for enhanced system resilience as well as utilizing ASN’s highly reliable submarine repeaters, all managed by its end-to-end submarine network management system. As part of the contract, ASN will also be in charge of project management, system design, marine operations and system commissioning supported by IOX’s own team of industry experienced personnel.

June 8, 2017
Wireless b’band speed: TRAI invites transparency & customer awareness ideas

NEW DELHI: The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India wants stakeholders to give their views on ensuring transparency and customer awareness regarding data speeds under wireless broadband plans and has suggested various tools that may be deployed for measuring data speeds

In a Consultation Paper on ‘Data Speed under Wireless Broadband Plans’, the Authority has asked stakeholders to respond to nine questions raised by it by 20 June with counter-comments if any by 13 July.

At the outset, it says the National Telecom Policy of 2012 (NTP-2012) has the vision of Broadband on Demand and envisages leveraging telecom infrastructure to enable all citizens and businesses, both in rural and urban areas, to participate in the Internet and web economy thereby ensuring equitable and inclusive development across the nation. It provides the enabling framework for enhancing India’s competitiveness in all spheres of the economy

Wireless access networks are the main source of delivering broadband in the country. Global mobile subscriptions are growing around 5 percent year-on-year. According to the Ericsson’s mobility report, India grew the most in terms of net additions during the third quarter of 2016 by adding 15 million connections. These figures have increased substantially in the last few quarters. Out of the total 236.09 million broadband subscribers in the country as of 31st December 2016 approximately 92.32% – 217.95 million subscribers – are through wireless access.

According to a GSMA report titled ‘The Mobile Economy, India 2016’, at the end of June 2016, 616 million unique users subscribed to mobile services in India, making it the second largest mobile market in the world. Almost half the country’s population now subscribes to a mobile service. The report suggests that improving affordability; falling device prices and better network coverage aided by operator investment will help deliver over 330 million new unique subscribers by 2020, taking the penetration rate to 68%. It further adds that as more users migrate to high-speed broadband, mobile data traffic is expected to grow 12-fold between 2015 and 2020, at a CAGR of 63%.

Data usage by GSM users has already shown an unprecedented growth in the recent months from an average usage of 236MB per month in September, 2016 to 884 MB per month in December 2016.

Along with this, the composition of revenues earned by operators is also changing. Mobile operators in India have so far reported limited revenue contribution from data services, generating 17% of service revenues at the end of 2015. This is forecast to increase to 23% by 2020.

The Broadband Policy of 2004 defined broadband as “An ‘always-on’ data connection that is able to support interactive services including Internet access and has the capability of the minimum download speed of 256 kilo bits per second (kbps) to an individual subscriber from the Point of Presence (POP) of the service provider intending to provide broadband service where multiple such individual broadband connections are aggregated and the subscriber is able to access these interactive services including the Internet through this POP. The interactive services will exclude any services for which a separate license is specifically required, for example, real-time voice transmission, except to the extent that it is presently permitted under ISP license with Internet Telephony”.

The questions raised in the paper, which discusses the various initiatives that have been taken by the Authority in relation to broadband speeds in India and their current status and provides a summary of the international experience on similar issues, are:

Q1: Is the information on wireless broadband speeds currently being made available to consumers is transparent enough for making informed choices? Q2: If it is difficult to commit a minimum download speed, then could average speed be specified by the service providers? What should be the parameters for calculating average speed?

Q3: What changes can be brought about to the existing framework on wireless broadband tariff plans to encourage better transparency and comparison between plans offered by different service providers? Q4: Is there a need to include/delete any of the QoS parameters and/or revise any of the benchmarks currently stipulated in the Regulations?

Q5: Should disclosure of average network performance over a period of time or at peak times including through broadband facts/labels be made mandatory? Q6: Should standard application/ websites be identified for mandating comparable disclosures about network speeds?

Q7: What are the products/technologies that can be used to measure actual end-user experience on mobile broadband networks? At what level should the measurements take place (e.g., on the 26 device, network node)? Q8: Are there any legal, security, privacy or data sensitivity issues with collecting device level data?

a) If so, how can these issues be addressed? b) Do these issues create a challenge for the adoption of any measurement tools?

Q9: What measures can be taken to increase awareness among consumers about wireless broadband speeds, availability of various technological tools to monitor them and any potential concerns that may arise in the process?

June 5, 2017
Sterlite unveils smarter optical tech & FTTH solutions at Anga Com ’17

MUMBAI: Sterlite Tech, an end-to-end global technology leader in smarter digital networks, has unveiled new optical communication technologies and integrated capabilities in designing, building and managing smarter digital networks at Anga Com 2017.

As partners to global telecom operators in Europe, Middle East, Latin America and Asian markets, Sterlite Tech has a focused business spanning smarter products, services and software solutions with operators in more than 100 countries. The new customised, high-quality smarter network introductions this year include:

FTTX Smarter Network Kit: Released by Susanne Stengade, CEO, 6X International, Denmark, Sterlite Tech’s highly reliable FTTX Smarter Network Kit addresses the needs of customers by providing fastest connectivity to the last-mile revenue-generating users in hours, instead of days. The solution is based on the simple approach of plug-and-play, with highest reliability and performance.

Indicium Lite Cable: Launched by Sean Pillans, Head of Access Engineering, Liberty Global, Indicium Lite Cable is suitable for outdoor FTTH deployments in less densely populated areas. The small inner modules in the cable are designed to be cut at one point in the network and retracted to another, where these can be fed or blown through microducts, directly to the customer premises. This solution helps in efficient deployment with zero fibre cuts.

Atlas Lite Cable: Unveiled by Christian Aasheim, CEO, Melbye Skandinavia AS, Atlas Lite Cable features ultra-compact, light-weight cable designs, containing maximised fibre capacity. This product family is versatile and finds application across access, FTTX, Drop and/or fibre to the desk links. These cables can be blown using compressed air in pre-installed micro ducts for long distance links.

Olympus Lite Cable: Launched by Luca Facchinetti, Director, Metallurgica Bresciana, Italy, this cable is suitable for hazardous or heavy construction zones including heavy traffic area, wind farm developments, pipelines, oil and gas fields, heavy industrial sites and a variety of additional harsh environments. Mainly used for Metro rail/Railway networks which employ products complying with major industry standards including BS EN 50200, BS 8434-2:2003. This product has safety at its core and meets the customer’s individual specification safety like data transmission security by maintaining circuit integrity under fire conditions, withstanding ultra-high temperatures and long service life.

Highlighting the new launches at Anga Com, Sterlite Tech CTO Dr Badri Gomatam said, “Our new products and solutions have been designed and developed in close engagement with all our key customers and considering their requirements for smarter network technologies that address the growing demands for higher bandwidth and last-mile connectivity.”

Sterlite Tech head – global sales – telecom products Ankit Agarwal said, “With our integrated knowledge and expertise in designing, building and managing smarter digital networks, we are partnering leading global telecom service providers and municipalities to realise the European Commission’s aggressive targets to create a Gigabit society through ultra-fast internet access by 2025. With our innovative and future-proof range of fibre connectivity solutions, telecom operators and ISPs can realise this vision, and enable smarter network roll-out in Europe and other geographies.”

June 2, 2017
ACT leads in wired subs adds, Jiojuggernaut marches on

BENGALURU: Atria Convergence Technologies Pvt. Ltd (ACT) leads in wired broadband internet subscribers additions in calendar year 2017 (CY-17) until 31 March 2017 (Mar-17) as per data released by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI). ACT has added 50,000 subscribers, of which 30,000 were added in March 2017 followed by Indian telecom major Bharti Airtel Limited (Airtel) which added 40,000 subscribers during the same period. The MukeshDhirubhaiAmbani led Reliance Industries Limited juggernaut Reliance JioInfocom Limited (Jio) continued as the company with the largest wireless broadband internet subscriber base in the country – all of it being wireless so far. Having overtaken the incumbent biggest wireless broad band internet player until Oct-16, Airtel, Jio had a subscriber base of 108.68 million (1086.8 lakh) in Mar-17.

One lakh (0.1 million) wired broadband internet subscribers were added in CY-17 as per TRAI data. Among the wireline ISP’s,BSNL is the biggest player by far with 99.8 lakh subscribers. BSNL added 30,000 wired broadband subscribers in CY-17.The second largest wireline ISP in India is Airtel which closed Mar-17 with 20.8 lakh wireline subscribers, after adding just 10,000 subscribers to its wireline internet subscriber base during Mar-17 and as mentioned above, 40,000 in CY-17. The third largest wireline broadband internet services provider was regional private player ACT Broadband with a subscriber base of 11.7 lakh at the end of Mar-18. The government run Mahanagar Sanchar Nigam Limited (MTNL) lost 30,000 subscribers in CY-17and had a subscriber base of 10.1 lakh at the end of Mar-17. The fifth player in the list of top five wireline broadband internet service providers in the country is another regional player – You Broadband or You BB. There was no change in the minnow’s subscriber base of 6.2 lakh in Mar-17 vis-à-vis Feb-17. Please refer to the figure below:

The wireless broadband internet subscriber base of the top 5 service providers grew by 22.09 percent (437.6lakh) in CY-17 from 1981.4 lakh to 2419 lakh in Mar-17. The top five service wireless internet service providers subscriber base grew 6.7 percent (151.9 lakh) between Feb-17 and Mar-17.
The top five wireless service providers constituted 87.48 percent market share of the totalbroadband subscribers at the end of Mar-17. These service providerswere Jio(108.68 million), Airtel (49.13million or 491.3 lakh), Vodafone (37.72 million or 377.2 lakh), Idea Cellular (24.70 millionor 247 lakh) and BSNL(21.67 or 216.7million).Jio added 35.52 million or 355.2 lakh (50.61 percent growth in CY-17 subscribers in CY-17 and 5.84 or 58.4 lakh (5.68 percent growth in Mar-17) subscribers in Mar-17.

Please refer to the figure below for All India wireless subscriber base and subscriber base of top 5 wireless broadband internet service providers:

Among the top 5 wireless broadband internet services providers in the country, Jio has shown the highest growth. Please refer to the figure below for growth of top 5 wireless broadband internet service providers in the country:

Notes: (1) The unit of currency in this report is the Indian rupee – Rs (also conventionally represented by INR). The Indian numbering system or the Vedic numbering system has been used to denote money values. The basic conversion to the international norm would be:
(a) 100,00,000 = 100 lakh = 10,000,000 = 10 million = 1 crore.
(b) 10,000 lakh = 100 crore = 1 arab = 1 billion.

(2) TRAI reports indicate data in millions of numbers up to 2 decimal places. Hence it is assumed in this report that a figure of 0.51 million (5.1 lakh) subscribers for You BB for Dec-2015 would be granular to the nearest 10,000. While percentages have been mentioned up to two decimal places, the accuracy may vary, depending upon the exact number.

(3) MSOs’ have a number of subsidiaries and alliances, hence broadband numbers are split as applicable. The consolidated subscription numbers of these entities could be larger. Hathway is a case in point.

May 22, 2017
Asianet Broadband to move into Tamil Nadu; launches superfast package in Kozhikode

MUMBAI: Down south, Asianet Broadband a part of Asianet Satellite Communications has announced it is spreading its wings into Tamil Nadu. Asianet Broadband has 200,000 subscribers from residential areas SMEs and office in 56 and cities towns across God’s own country Kerala.

It made this announcement last week, along with the introduction of a super fast broadband package.

The new package called GIGA Fibre 200 it is being offered in Calicut and is being delivered over its brand new optical fibre network, it passing over 45,000 homes in the city at launch. The idea is to take it up to 100,000 homes across the city and outskirts in phases,the company says.

Asainet Broadband has a total bandwidth capacity of more than 30 Gbps, which is the largest in the state of Kerala among the new generation private ISPs.

The GIGA Fibre 200 package priced of Rs 999 a month at 200 MBPS speeds with a 200 GB limit. Asianet has a sweetener attached to the package: those paying three months advance rent in advance will get the wifi modem free.. The delivery of the broadband is being done using tate of the art DOCSIS & GPON technology.

Optic Points out Asianet Satellite Communications president & COO . G.Sankaranarayana: “ Lightning fast downloads, simultaneous streaming, plenty of data & very Hi speed to ensure a great experience even with multiple users. New areas like Virtual reality, Telemedicine etc are all possible today. Possibilities are endless. Kozhikode is just a start and we are going to rollout GIGA fiber across other markets in Kerala too.”

May 22, 2017