Cellular telephony has emerged as the fastest growing segment in the Indian telecom industry. The major segments include, fixed lines, wireless, broadband, IPTV & value added services. Given the low penetration levels in the country and continuously falling tariffs, demand will continue to remain higher in the foreseeable future across all the segments. At t...more

Cellular telephony has emerged as the fastest growing segment in the Indian telecom industry. The major segments include, fixed lines, wireless, broadband, IPTV & value added services. Given the low penetration levels in the country and continuously falling tariffs, demand will continue to remain higher in the foreseeable future across all the segments. At the end of March 2009, the country’s total telecom subscriber base (fixed plus mobile) stood at about 429 m. The tele-density level stood at about 36% by the end of the fiscal. The huge market share of public sector behemoths, MTNL and BSNL in fixed lines is likely to get reduced further as the penetration by private players spreads. During the current fiscal, a lot of focus will be given to new policy initiatives in the industry. The predominant one is the allocation of spectrum for the 3G and broadband wireless access (BWA) services. In addition, the telecom regulator TRAI recently unveiled a draft to allow mobile number portability (MNP) which allows subscribers to switch networks without changing the number. TRAI: Telecom & Regulatory Authority of India; DoT: Department of Telecommunication; MNP: Mobile Number Portability; VAS: Value Added Services; BWA: Broadband Wireless Access; GSM: Global system for Mobile telecommunication; CDMA: Code Division multiple Access; MHz: MegaHertz  hide