Indian telecom equipment revenues up by 24%

NEW DELHI, INDIA: Revenues of the Indian telecom equipment industry grew by 24 per cent to touch Rs 95,407 crore in 2007-08, according to an annual survey by Voice&Data, a CyberMedia Publication.

The 13th annual survey 'V&D 100' covered over 500 telecom companies in India spanning carrier equipment, enterprise communication equipment, and handset manufacturers.

According to the survey, more than half of the telecom equipment revenue came from carrier equipment manufacturers, which grew 32 per cent to touch Rs 56,994 crore during the year. The enterprise equipment grew at 27 per cent to report revenues of Rs13,210 crore. The phone segment, contributed nearly one-fourth to the total telecom equipment industry, at Rs 25,203 crore recording a growth of seven per cent.

Commenting on the results of the survey, Prasanto K Roy, Chief Editor of CyberMedia's business publications said, "This is robust growth for the Indian telecom equipment market--24% on such a large base. It continues to be driven by the rising demand for mobile handsets, especially beyond the metros, and the consequent wireless infrastructure expansion by service providers."

Mobile handset maker Nokia had the highest revenue during the year followed by telecom network equipment major Ericsson, Nokia Siemens Networks, Alcatel-Lucent and Wipro. The other players in the top 10 were Cisco, TCS, Infosys, Sony Ericsson and ZTE.

While Nokia and Ericsson retained their positions as the top players, Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN), struck major deals in the wireless segment to rise to number 3. The Top 10 club also saw the entry of Sony Ericsson at ninth position as its revenues grew 122.4 per cent to Rs. 3,083 crore. Alcatel Lucent, with 40 per cent growth moved from the fifth rank to the fourth.

"Expansion of mobile networks and broadband infrastructure, and the introduction of 3G technology, will sustain the growth in the current year," adds Roy.

Segment Wise Break-Up

In the handset segment, revenues of companies making mobile handsets grew 12 per cent to Rs. 24,003 crore while the fixed handset sales decreased by 41 per cent to Rs. 1200 crore, over the same period last year. This indicates consumer preference for the more affordable, convenient and feature rich mobile handsets over the fixed phone.

The Indian handset market recorded a 33 per cent growth by volume with 95.6 million pieces sold during the year against 71.8 million in the same period in the previous year. Of the total handsets sold 68.3 million were based on GSM technology and 27.3 million on CDMA. The GSM handsets sales reported a growth of 34 per cent compared to a 28 per cent for CDMA phones.

Nokia had the highest market share in the handset space at 62.5 per cent followed by Sony Ericsson (12.8 per cent), Samsung and LG (both 6.2 per cent), Motorola (5 per cent), ZTE (3.5 per cent), Huawei (1.3 per cent) and Haier (1.2 per cent).

Within the carrier equipment business, wireless infrastructure segment grew 43 per cent to report revenues of Rs 23,770 crore. The telecom software grew nearly 29 per cent to record revenue of Rs 23,018 crore. Broadband infrastructure segment grew 68 per cent to post revenues of Rs. 1510 crore as broadband connections increased during the year.

The enterprise equipment business grew by 27 per cent to Rs. 13,210 crore in FY 2007-08. While Network security business recorded a growth of 73 per cent at Rs. 456 crore, the network storage business grew by 47 per cent to record revenue of Rs. 1446 crore.