3G to bring positive impact on the ARPUs: Airtel

BANGALORE, INDIA: Bharti Airtel, which announced the launch of 3G services in Karnataka on Monday, is expecting a positive growth in the Average Revenue Per User (ARPU) from the services. By March 2011, the telecom major is planning to expand the services to all the 13 circles where it has got 3G license.

According to Atul Mohan Bindal, president, mobile services, Bharti Airtel, 3G will bring positive impact on the ARPUs.

“3G provides host of services, like live TV, downloads, browsing etc... This indicates that in future, while the voice ARPU would more or less stabilize, there would be explosion of the data ARPU.”

Though he declined to share any specific figures on growth and expected increase, he said, “Globally there has been a faster growth in the data ARPU than that from voice.”

Past couple of years, telecom operator have had the worry of falling ARPUs, given the price war and declining call rates. The APRU revenue analysis report of the company indicates that (when compared with the last quarter) while ARPUs increased by 3-5 per cent, a few circles like Kolkata, Mumbai, Maharashtra saw a decline.

In order to ensure country-wide coverage of 3G, Airtel is in talks with service providers of other circles.

Bindal said, “It is a fact that none of the service providers has got all the circles. So the partnership will be a quid-pro-quo, where we can work together.”

Vineet Taneja, operations director, mobile services, said, Airtel's 3G offering, coupled with the freedom to choose own network provider (mobile number portability) would attract more customers.

He said, “A lot of service providers launched 3G even before readying the network infrastructure. We have done network optimization for 3G, have prepared a solution to monitor video calls, we even completed the training of call executives to solve the issues and we are making our retail stores as experience zones, where customers can experience the service. We believe that customer will join Airtel and stick around because of our network, services and the experience.”

He added that for first timers who want to switch to 3G, Airtel offers a least sachet of Rs 10. Customers can also elevate to 45 minute use or Rs 60 use. Heavy users can opt for monthly rental Rs. 650 with 1.25GB of data. Applying the formula of fair usage policy, if a user crosses the data limit, the bandwidth is brought down to 128kbps. Any Airtel customer can upgrade from a 2G to 3G by texting 3G to 121.