Reliance Jio, the newest entrant in the Indian telecom market, has now become the largest telecom operator in the country in terms of both subscriber base as well as revenue share. This is quite impressive given that the company started operations just three years ago.
As per the data released by Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), Jio added 5.6 million new subscribers in November 2019, surpassing all other telecom players. With this, the company’s total user base has now reached to 369.93 million. There however, was a decline in subscriber base growth.
The company has now replaced Vodafone Idea as the India’s largest mobile services provider by subscribers. Jio is now holding 32.04 percent market share, which has increased compared to 30.79 percent share at the end of October.
In November 2019, Vodafone Idea lost 36.41 million subscribers and is left with a market share of 29.12 percent. On the other hand, Bharti Airtel has added 1.65 million new subscribers, taking its total to 327.3 million in the same month. It held a 28.35 percent market share following the increase in its wireless subscriber base.
It’s noteworthy that despite the increase in the number of subscribers by Jio and Airtel, the telecom sector lost 28.81 million users, the biggest decline witnessed by this industry since April 2018.
Since Jio entered the market, the telecom industry in India witnessed shrinking revenue streams, bankruptcy and, finally, consolidation. But, the last three years have been monumental as 4G coverage soared and became a catalyst for the growth of mobile data and new applications and services.
Entry on Jio led to an unprecedented rise in mobile data consumption, with an average user consuming 11 GB of data per month. Many companies either shut shop or were acquired by bigger companies. Thus, the market now witnessed a three-way tussle between Airtel, Vodafone Idea and Jio.
