GSM SUBSCRIBER BASE DECLINED IN AUGUST

The Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), in its figures for August 2012 for all of India, revealed that the total GSM subscriber base in the country now stands at 671.95 million. In its report, theCOAI further notes that this total subscriber base figure had been arrived at as GSM operators in the country, including Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea Cellular put together lost more than 7.10 million subscribers. Most GSM subscribers, i.e., 0.79 million were added in the review period by Aircel. Chennai saw most GSM subscriptions, i.e., 1,07,131 being added in the review period.

Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea Cellular, put together account for roughly 68 percentof the GSM market and in the review period, they lost over 5.10 million users. Bharti Airtel has a 27.82 percent market share, and in the review period, lost 1.90 million users making its subscriber base fall to 186.9 million.


Going further, the report foundthat Idea Cellular and Vodafone,two other popular players in the market lost 1.64 million users and 1.55 million users, respectively. With this, Idea Cellular's subscriber base stoodat 115.97 million, while that of Vodafone was at 153.35 million at the end of August 2012.

As per the figures, Aircel and Loop Mobile emerged as the only operators to have witnessed growth in the review period. While Aircel added 793,717 new users, Loop Mobile added 79,842 newsubscribers in August 2012. Uninor, on the other hand, as per the figures in the report saw the sharpest decline of 2.38 million users, and its subscriber base now stands at 42.11 million at the end of August 2012.