Appreciable increase in broadband subscribers between May and June this year

NEW DELHI: As compared to marginal increases in the previous months, broadband subscribers grew by 5.35 per cent between May and June this year, according to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI).

The total number of subscribers went up from 65.33 million to 68.83 million in all segments: wired subscribers, mobile device users (phones + dongles) and fixed wireless (wi-fi, wi-max, point-to-point radio and VSAT).

Unlike previous months, the largest change of 6.93 per cent was seen in the mobile segment, while there was a change of 2.51 per cent in the fixed wireless category and only 0.13 per cent in the wired subscribers.

The top five broadband service providers constitute 84.98 per cent market share of total broadband subscribers at the end of June. They are BSNL (18.53 million), Bharti (14.76 million), Vodafone (10.30 million), Idea Cellular (8.78 million) and Reliance Communications Group (6.11 million). TRAI said that the wireless subscribers with less than 1MB data usage in a month are not considered as internet/broadband subscribers by Reliance and Idea.

The top five wired broadband service providers are BSNL (9.98 million), Bharti (1.39 million), MTNL (1.13 million), Beam Telecom (0.40 million) and YOU Broadband (0.39 million).

The top five wireless broadband service providers are Bharti (13.38 million), Vodafone (10.30 million), Idea Cellular (8.78 million), BSNL (8.55 million) and Reliance Communications Group (6.00 Million).

In telecom, private operators hold 89.85 per cent of the wireless subscriber market share whereas the public-sector operators BSNL and MTNL hold only 10.15 per cent market share.