The Indian telecommunications market will enter 2025 in just a few days, as we begin another year in this transformative journey toward greater connectivity with Gigabit speeds. That said, private operators, Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Idea, and Reliance Jio are focusing on their respective growth strategies. As we progress through December and markets enter holiday mode, let’s take a snapshot of the current scenario for Indian private telecom operators, based on their recent quarterly reports.
Bharti Airtel reported strong growth in its Mobile ARPU, which reached Rs 233 (USD 2.8) in Q2FY25. The second-largest telecom operator in India reported 263.6 million mobile smartphone customers (4G/5G) as of the quarter ending September 2024, with mobile data consumption per customer at 23.9GB per month. The operator added 26.2 million subscribers, increasing its market share in the smartphone (4G/5G) segment.
Postpaid Segment
Airtel also strengthened its “leadership position in the postpaid segment” with a net addition of 0.80 million customers in Q2FY25, increasing its postpaid customer base to 24.7 million. However, the overall Airtel postpaid subscriber base, including IoT and M2M connections, is around 53.11 million.
Reliance Jio
Reliance Jio, the largest telecom operator in India, reported a total subscriber base of 479 million as of September 2024 (Q2FY25), with 148 million 5G subscribers contributing to 34 percent of wireless data usage. Notably, Jio said it reached these True5G subscribers in less than two years of launching and continues to be the largest 5G operator outside of China. Jio also claimed to be the fastest-growing fixed wireless operator globally, with over 2.8 million JioAirFiber connections.
Jio reported an ARPU of Rs 195.1, driven by the partial impact of a tariff hike and the scale-up of home and digital services businesses. Jio has never disclosed its postpaid numbers, so there are no specific figures available to report. However, Jio offers very competitive postpaid tariffs to its users.
Vodafone Idea, in its Q2FY25 report, said its 4G expansion is progressing with a target to achieve 4G population coverage of 1.1 billion by March 2025 and 1.2 billion by September 2025.
As of September 30, 2024, Vodafone Idea had 205 million subscribers, with approximately 61 percent of them using 4G/5G services. Although Vi reported 4G/5G subscribers, since the telco has not launched 5G services, we can assume these subscribers are using 4G, as Vi has followed different conventions for reporting 4G users across its reports. That said, Vi reported a 4G subscriber base of 125.9 million at the end of Q2FY25.
Blended ARPU
Interestingly, Vi changed how it reports ARPU in this quarter. The third-largest Indian operator reported an ARPU of Rs 166, excluding M2M, whereas the operator did not specify such M2M exclusions until Q1FY25, when ARPU stood at Rs 146.
To clarify, Vi reported blended ARPU until Q1FY25, whereas it started reporting customer ARPU excluding M2M in Q2FY25. If we use the operator’s earlier practice of reporting, the blended ARPU as of Q2FY25 would be Rs 156. However, in Q2FY25, Vi reported customer ARPU excluding M2M at Rs 166, showcasing an increase.
Regarding the postpaid subscriber base, Vi emphasised the postpaid segment in its quarterly report, stating, “In the postpaid segment, we have been able to increase our customer base on a QoQ as well as YoY basis. While a larger part of this increase is from the M2M segment, we have seen a consistent increase in retail postpaid customers over the last year.”
The company also changed how it reports its postpaid subscriber base this time. Vi reported a postpaid subscriber base of 24.5 million in Q2FY25. However, it is not clear if these numbers include M2M connections. Until Q1FY25, the operator reported the prepaid subscriber base as a percentage of the total base, from which the postpaid user base could be derived.
In conclusion, as per the recent announcements, Vi is focusing on 4G network expansion with plans to roll out 5G in key geographies starting in Q4FY25.
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