Broadband
Wired broadband subscriber base sees turnaround in May
KOLKATA: After seeing a dip in April, the number of broadband subscribers reached 683.77 million at the end of May with an overall growth of 1.13 per cent.
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has released the telecom subscription data as on May 2020. As per the report, the top five service providers constituted 98.93 per cent market share of the total broadband subscribers at the end of May. The wired broadband sector has emerged as the top gainer with a growth of 1.88 per cent. However, home broadband footprint growth remains sluggish in the country. As on 31st May, 2020, the top five Wireless Broadband Service providers were Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd (392.75 million), Bharti Airtel (143.55 million), Vodafone Idea (113.05 million), BSNL (14.14 million) and MTNL (0.29 million).
Overall subscriber growth:
Reliance Jio has added 3.73 million subscribers reaching 393.72 million overall. Among the top five players, Atria Convergence remains one of the top gainers touching a subscriber base of 1.64 million. At the end of last December, its subscriber base was at 1.52 million. Among other players, Bharti Airtel has seen an addition of 1.2 million subscribers, standing at 145.96 million subscriber base. 1.68 million new users have subscribed to Vodafone Idea’s broadband network in the month. State-run BSNL has also gained 0.53 million new subscribers.
Segment-wise growth:
Among the telecom providers, Jio has gained in the wired broadband sector also as it has added 0.07 million in May. On the other hand, Airtel has lost 0.03 million subscribers. The top five Wired Broadband Service providers were BSNL (7.93 million), Bharti Airtel (2.41 million), Atria Convergence Technologies (1.64 million), Hathway Cable & Datacom (0.97 million) and Reliance Jio (0.97 million).
Broadband
Zoff Foods extends Shilpa Shetty partnership into ninth year
Spice brand reinforces trust-led positioning amid growth and funding push.
MUMBAI: Nine years, one flavour and the recipe clearly still works. Zoff Foods has extended its long-running association with Shilpa Shetty, marking nine consecutive years of her as brand ambassador as the company scales its presence across Indian households. What began as a digital-first collaboration has gradually evolved into a defining element of the brand’s identity. Over nearly a decade, the partnership has mirrored Zoff’s own journey from an emerging challenger to a fast-growing FMCG player with a widening footprint across e-commerce, quick commerce and offline retail channels.
The logic behind the continuity is straightforward. In a category where trust and familiarity drive purchase decisions, particularly in spices and ready-to-cook segments, long-term associations tend to carry more weight than short bursts of visibility. Shetty’s positioning as a fitness-conscious, health-aware public figure aligns with the brand’s emphasis on purity and quality factors that are increasingly shaping consumer choices in modern Indian kitchens.
The extension also comes at a time when Zoff Foods is entering a more aggressive growth phase. The company recently raised $2 million in a Pre-Series B funding round led by JM Financial Private Equity, with participation from Aman Gupta, signalling a push towards expanding distribution, product innovation and market reach.
Company executives have positioned the continued partnership as a strategic anchor amid this expansion, reinforcing brand recall while entering new markets. For Shetty, the association remains rooted in shared values around authenticity and ingredient integrity attributes that resonate strongly with increasingly mindful consumers.
In a market crowded with new-age brands and shifting loyalties, Zoff’s approach suggests a different playbook: build slowly, stay consistent, and let familiarity do the heavy lifting. Because sometimes, in both branding and cooking, it’s not about reinventing the dish, it’s about perfecting it over time.
