Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) has released the GSM subscriber base for December 2009 and, quite expectantly, new additions continue at a higher rate. There has been highest growth rate registered due to some new player like Uninor and S Tel commence their GSM service in various circles, lowest SMS and Roaming tariff by some operators, and Pay Per second tariff adopted by most all GSM operators in last month. The number of new GSM subscribers being added in December month 12.51 million as compared to at a monthly growth rate of 3.41%.
Among the GSM Mobile Service Operators, Vodafone Essar added 2.7mn new users in December, taking its total base to 91.40mn while market leader and largest GSM operator Bharti Airtel record the highest new additions of 2.85mn subscribers by growth rate of 2.46, its total base raised to 118.86mn. Idea Cellular added 1.70mn new customers, boosting its subscriber base to 57.61mn, while Aircel increased its base by over 1.66mn to 31.02mn at highest growth rate.
State operator BSNL added 2.36mn new customers which are just double from last month, taking its reach to 57.22mn. Loop Mobile added 54,276 new subscribers, taking its total to 2.64mn. MTNL added 57,009 new customers, boosting its total base to 4.6mn. Latest entrant in the Indian GSM arena Uninor the mobile service brand of Unitech and Telenor added 1.2mn GSM subscriber in the first month of its operations while S Tel managed just 1,41,411 new subscribers from 3 circles where it stats its GSM mobile service in last month.
In terms of growth rate Aircel again registered the highest growth of 5.69% with 1.66 million subscribers while Idea cellular recorded monthly additions at 3.05% with 1.70 million new subscribers which is just half from last months additions. Market leader Airtel rocks this month and added highest new subscribers at growth of 2.46% and 2.85 million new subscribers while PSU BSNL recorded 3.69% growth with good performance of 2.36 million new additions. Vodafone Essar managed a growth of 3.15% with 2.79 million new additions. If we compare the circle-wise growth than Bihra and Uttar Pradesh (west) circle managed the highest growth rate of 5.71% and 5.34%respectively while Mumbai Merto circle recorded lowest groth rate of just 1.26%.
GSM Opertaor wise % market share – Dec’2009
| GSM Operator | Total Subscriber base | % Market Share |
| Bharti Airtel | 118864031 | 31.29% |
| Vodafone Essar | 91401959 | 24.06% |
| IDEA Cellular | 57611872 | 15.17% |
| BSNL | 57223482 | 15.06 |
| Aircel | 31023997 | 8.17% |
| Reliance Telecom* (Smart GSM) | 15156401 | 3.99% |
| MTNL | 4565260 | 1.20% |
| Loop Mobile | 2649730 | 0.70% |
| Uninor | 1208130 | 0.32% |
| S Tel | 141411 | 0.04% |
| All India Total | 379846273 | 100% |
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