Bharti Airtel, India's second largest telecom operator posted a flat ARPU (average revenue per user) in Q4 FY25. The ARPU remained unchanged from Rs 245 in the previous quarter. This is a not good sign for the telco that aims to only add premium customers in its portfolio. This signals that for an entire quarter, the drive of the telco's towards premiumisation of plans and services didn't pan out as it would have liked. Bharti Airtel's ARPU is still the leading figure in the industry. The competition, Reliance Jio stands at Rs 206.2. Even though Airtel added 0.6 million postpaid users and 6.6 million smartphone data consumers to its base, the ARPU didn't move upwards.
This suggests that the effect of the July 2024 tariff hike has likely come in its entirety for Bharti Airtel. Jio showed some improvements, and thus, it will be interesting to see what happens with Vodafone Idea (Vi) in the near future.
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Will Airtel Hike Tariffs Again?
Bharti Airtel offers the most premium services in the industry. The company's plans are mirrored by Vodafone Idea (Vi) in pricing. However, with Airtel, there are more 4G customers and thus its ARPU is much higher than Vi's.
The important question to ask here is whether Airtel will again hike the tariffs now that the ARPU stands still. The telcos have time and again said that the tariffs need to go up. While Crisil expects the industry return on capital employed (ROCE) to move up to 12% in this fiscal, the telcos are still worried about their returns.
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The next round of tariff hikes could be closer if the ARPU growth slows down signficantly for every player. But again, Airtel can't be the first player to hike the prices. It will have to be in collaboration with the other players to avoid any scenario of customer loss.
No particular timeline is present for the next tariff hike. It will depend on the telcos and their general mood and understanding of the market.
