The Sunil Mittal-led company Airtel has managed to surpass Reliance Jio in the run of adding new subscribers to its platform for the second consecutive month in October. The rise of subscribers has given Airtel 3.7 million new users in October while Jio acquired 2.23 million, according to the monthly subscription data by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI).
This shift ensues while Vodafone Idea (VI) is being drained of customers, as it lost 2.65 million subscribers in the month. Similarly, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) saw a drop of 10,215 wireless subscribers in the same month to have a total wireless subscriber base of 118.88 million. In contrast,
Jio has maintained its hegemony as the largest telecom operator in India with 406 million wireless subscribers and a market share of 35.28 percent in October. The company was followed by Airtel, which stood second with 28.68 percent market share, while VI and BSNL came third and fourth with 25.42 percent and 10.33 percent, respectively.
The percentage of active subscribers, which is the percentage of active subscribers to total subscribers, has taken a small dip, after rising in September. Airtel has managed to maintain the highest percentage of active subscribers, followed by VI and Jio.
When it comes to inactive subscribers, Jio has seen a constant increase in the gap between its total subscribers versus active ones for the third month. Airtel too has seen a rise in inactive subscribers after remaining constant since July. VI, on the other hand, has seen a decline in the one of its inactive subscribers.
The TRAI report also stated that a total of 8.80 million Mobile Number Portability (MNP) requests were received in October, rose from 8.71 million in September. As a result of aggressive attitude taken by telcos to onboard new customers, the MNP requests have never been this high in over two years. Analysts feel that the increased number indicate that customers are fast changing operators in a bid to get a better deal.
