India adds 2.49 mln mobile users in July

Shailendra Bhatnagar

NEW DELHI: India's booming wireless sector, the world's fastest growing major mobile market, added 2.49 million new users in July, taking the total number of customers to 60.366 million, industry bodies said on Tuesday.

The Cellular Operators' Association, representing nine carriers offering mobile services based on the widely prevalent Global System for Mobile (GSM) communication, said 1.954 million customers signed up for its services.

Overall, GSM carriers had 46.874 million customers at the end of July, up 4.35 percent over June.

The strong growth in the past month came despite heavy monsoon rains that wreaked havoc in Bombay, a top market for cellular services, T.V. Ramachandran, director general of the Cellular Operators' Association, said.

"Traditionally, July shows weak demand because of widespread rains," Ramachandran said. "So this growth is all the more heartening."

He said he expected monthly additions to rise further in the coming quarters as carriers were expanding in rural areas.

Local mobile call tariffs of as low as 2 U.S. cents a minute are driving cellular usage in India, where less than six people in 100 in the more than a billion-strong population use mobile services.

India's top mobile services firm, Bharti Tele-Ventures Ltd., added 533,218 GSM wireless users, taking its customer base to 12.789 million subscribers.

State-run Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd., the second-ranked GSM player, had a mobile user base of 10.724 million customers. It added 494,469 subscribers in July.

Hutchison Essar Telecom Ltd., the Indian wireless operation of Hong Kong's Hutchison Telecommunications International Ltd., added 494,469 mobile users last month. The firm's user base stood at 8.844 million customers.

GSM companies compete with carriers such as Reliance Infocomm Ltd. who offer similar services based on code division multiple access technology.

The association representing CDMA operators said these firms signed up 535,330 new users in the past month, taking their combined user base to 12.341 million customers.

Bombay-based Reliance Infocomm accounted for the bulk of the new CDMA additions. The firm attracted 360,110 customers and raised its mobile user base to 10.647 million.