ITV

Tag: 4G Service

  • Reliance Jio to raise Rs 3000 crore via debentures

    Reliance Jio to raise Rs 3000 crore via debentures

    MUMBAI: Even as it gears up to launch its much touted 4G service pan India, Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Jio Infocomm is planning to raise Rs 3000 crore by issuing secured redeemable non-convertible debentures on private placement basis.

     

    As was reported earlier by Indiantelevision.com, Reliance Jio is slated to launch its 4G services across India on 28 December, which also happens to be the birth anniversary of the family’s patriarch Dhirubhai Ambani.

     

    In a regulatory filing, Reliance Jio said, “… pursuant to the approval of the board of directors and shareholders, the company proposes to issue secured redeemable non-convertible debentures aggregating up to Rs 3,000 crore on private placement basis,”

     

    It may be recalled that in May this year, Reliance Jio had taken a 12-year loan of Rs 4500 crore from Korea Trade Insurance Corporation (K-sure) for its 4G rollout. The funds were to be used to finance goods and services from Samsung Electronics and Ace Technologies Corp, which are being tapped for its infrastructure rollout. Thereafter in July, the company announced plans to raise Rs 4,500 crore through debentures.

     

    Reliance Jio is currently present across all 29 Indian states, with a direct physical presence in approximately 18,000 cities and towns, and more than one lakh villages. Ambani plans to launch 4G services with an approximate investment of Rs 100,000 crore.

  • Airtel goes full throttle with 4G across 296 cities

    Airtel goes full throttle with 4G across 296 cities

    MUMBAI: Bharti Airtel is gung ho on its 4G service – LTE, which has now been launched across 296 Indian cities, followed by successful trials in select cities.

     

    With the new services, Airtel customers across the country will be able to experience high speed wireless broadband along with uninterrupted HD video streaming, super fast uploading and downloading of movies, music and images. 


    Airtel 4G is available to customers across a range of smart devices including mobile phones, dongles, 4G hotspots and Wi-Fi dongles.

    Bharti Airtel MD and CEO Gopal Vittal said, “With the help of the feedback received from the beta launches, we have now built India’s first commercial 4G network that will make high speed mobile broadband a reality. The national roll-out today is another small step in our journey to be the most innovative and customer focused brand.”


    He further mentioned that the new platform is critical to developing an ecosystem that nurtures innovation and enabling access a myriad set of possibilities on their mobile phones. “Our 4G network is built on an open partner ecosystem model that brings together the best in the industry and introduces the market to these never before experiences. Together with our network and device partners, we have enabled a deeper proliferation of 4G in the country and I take this opportunity to thank them for working with us to introduce India to the amazing 4G experience,” said Vittal.

    As part of the 4G services, Airtel has also introduced ‘Infinity Plans’ that will offer unlimited voice calls on mobile, along with bundled movies and music for the first time in India. 


    Continuing its streak of firsts, Flexpage, an automated platform that allows customers to track their data usage and get real time usage alerts, has also been introduced by the company. 


    Along with a range of strategic initiatives as part of its 4G roll out, Airtel also launched a new carrier agnostic mobile app – ‘Wynk Movies’ – a first of its kind movie mall that will offer a specially curated library of thousands of movies and other popular videos. This follows the recent launch of Wynk Music.

  • Vodafone revenue down 0.9%; India revenue up 6.9%, leads growth

    Vodafone revenue down 0.9%; India revenue up 6.9%, leads growth

    BENGALURU: The Vodafone Group reported resurgence in the Africa, Middle East and Asia Pacific region (AMAP), with Turkey showing a 15 per cent y-o-y organic growth followed by India with 6.9 per cent organic growth. The Group’s reported service revenue declined 2.9 per cent y-o-y to €9169 million, while growing organically by 2.9 per cent.

     

    Note: Organic growth presents performance on a comparable basis, both in terms of merger and acquisition activity and movements in foreign exchange rates.

     

    The Group’s India reported service revenue grew by 10.6 per cent to €1133 million in Q1-2016 as compared to the €1024 million in Q1-2015 on with continued customer base growth and acceleration in the take-up of 3G offsetting continued pressure on voice pricing.

     

    Also, data revenue in India grew 65 per cent supported by the addition of 3.1 million new data customers, taking the total to 66.8 million. Vodafone says that smartphone penetration in India is now 26 per cent across the country and 47 per cent in the four metro circles and now has 22 million 3G customers compared to 10 million a year ago.

     

    The Group says that while total voice traffic continues to grow, the outgoing rate per minute has continued to decline, reflecting increased competition. The average minutes of use per customer is lower than a year ago but has increased slightly compared to the previous quarter. Total mobile customers increased 1.6 million giving a closing customer base of 185.4 million.

     

    Further, the Group informs that the progress on Project Spring in India remains strong with 1,000 2G sites and 1,100 3G sites added in the quarter (14,000 2G and 21,000 3G since the build commenced), taking Vodafone India’s 3G outdoor population coverage in targeted urban areas to 91 per cent. Vodafone India is now trialing 4G services across selected areas and continues to expand its M-Pesa service and now has 501,000 active customers supported by 94,000 agents.

     

    Q-o-q, Vodafone India led subscriber base growth with an increase of 0.86 per cent to 185.384 million with net post-paid (contract) additions of 449,000 and net prepaid additions of 1.132 million as compared to the 183.803 million in Q4-2015.

     

    Overall, Vodafone Group’s subscriber base grew 0.75 per cent to 449.193 million with 1.296 million post-paid and 2.111 million prepaid customers as compared to the 445.836 million in Q4-2015.

     

    Vodafone Group’s AMAP region continues to grow strongly, with organic service revenue increasing 6.1 per cent (Q4: 5.8 per cent) with growth in all major markets. Excluding the impact of MTR (Mobile Termination rates are the charges which one telecommunications operator charges to another for terminating calls on its network) cuts, organic service revenue increased 7.7 per cent (Q4: 7.3 per cent). The region continues to see strong customer growth, with 4.3 million added in the quarter, and an increasing number of the Group’s customers are now using data, with 6.6 million active data users added in the quarter. Customer usage continues to grow throughout the region, with voice and data usage up 7 per cent and 97 per cent respectively. Total AMP revenue increased 5.5 per cent, including a 2.5 percentage point adverse impact from foreign exchange movements.

     

    Europe reported and organic revenues declined y-o-y by 6.2 and 1.5 per cent respectively. The Vodafone Group reported revenue declined 0.9 per cent in Q1-2016 (Quarter ended 30 June, 2015) to €10113 million, while organic revenue grew 3.3 per cent.

     

    Vodafone’s Europe reported revenue declined 3.1 per cent to €6501 million, but grew organically by 1.1 per cent as compared to the €6768 million in the corresponding year ago quarter. As mentioned above, Europe’s reported and organic service revenue declined by 6.2 and 1.5 per cent respectively to €5793 million in Q1-2016 as compared to the €6367 million in Q1-2015.

     

    Vodafone Group CEO Vittorio Colao said, “We have made a good start to the year. Our emerging markets have maintained their strong momentum and more of our European businesses are returning to growth, as customer demand for 4G and data takes off. We continue to hit our Project Spring build milestones and customers are beginning to value the improvement in service that is resulting: contract churn in Europe is now falling and mobile ARPU trends are stabilising in a number of key markets. Our other key growth areas – unified communications and enterprise – are performing strongly, benefiting from the increased capabilities and footprint that our higher levels of investment are delivering. However, our markets are, as always, highly competitive and we therefore have to remain very focused on efficiency, cost control, and excellent value and service to customers, while continuing to deliver a good return for shareholders.”