Vodafone Idea in Deep Trouble Over Subscriber Losses When it comes to loss in subscribers, it is worth noting that in total, the industry lost 28.8 million subscribers. This was, however, the net loss, meaning that while some of the operators lost subscribers, others gained a few. Amongst the losing telecom companies was the Vodafone Idea. Vodafone Idea lost a massive 36.4 million subscribers in the November month. On the other hand, the rest of the three major telecom companies, BSNL, Bharti Airtel and Reliance Jio added subscribers. In the November month, Reliance Jio added 5.6 million subscribers, whereas Bharti Airtel and BSNL added 1.6 million and 0.34 million subscribers respectively. Speaking of market share, Reliance Jio was the top telecom operator in the industry with 32.04% of the market share and with the rest two major telecom companies Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea occupying 28.53% and 29.12% of the market share. BSNL occupied 10.19% of the total market share in the wireless segment. BSNL Retains Top Spot for Wired Service As for the wired services and the wireline subscribers, the data showed some interesting things. Although BSNL was the operator with the most market share in terms of wireline services with 46.21% of the market, it also lost 1.64 lakh subscribers in the November month. Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea added subscribers in this period. Reliance Jio added as much as 42,198 subscribers in this period whereas Bharti Airtel added 7,793 subscribers. On the second number in the market share pie was Bharti Airtel which occupies 20.24% of the market share. Reliance Jio currently only occupies 4.81% of the broadband market. In the broadband market, combining both wired and wireless subscribers, we got to see that Reliance Jio stayed at the top of the market share with 56.07% share of the pie. Other players included were Bharti Airtel with 21.16%, Vodafone Idea with 18.13% and BSNL and ACT with 3.41% and 0.23% market share. Almost 5 Million MNP Requests in November Month Another thing to note in the Trai data is the fact that although all the states lost wireless subscribers, the most losses happened in the J&K region. The region witnessed a decline of 12.9% in the wireless subscribers in the region mostly because of network cut-offs. Since the Trai data also highlights the MNP requests, the report noted that during November 2019, 4.88 million requests were received for MNP. Overall, the largest loss in the subscriber base has happened for Vodafone Idea, which continues to lose subscribers over its network integration.
