Telecom network vendor Ericsson has predicted that India will have 390 million 3G and 105 million 4G subscribers by 2020, while 2G will have 650 million users.
This is a bad news for Indian telecom operators which are pinning hopes on the 4G LTE bandwagon. Reliance Jio Infocomm, a 4G venture of RIL Chairman Mukesh Ambani, is expected to launch 4G LTE services in the fourth quarter of 2014 – after buying the BWA spectrum in 2010.
Till now, substantial investment in 4G projects did not happen because lack of a strong eco-system and a viable business model in India. Bharti Airtel is the only telecom to launch 4G services in India – in select cities. Earlier, Airtel claimed that it had achieved around 100,000 LTE subscribers. India has around 850 million mobile subscribers.
Apparently, Ericsson is yet to open its 4G account in India. Its rivals Nokia Networks (earlier known as NSN), Huawei and ZTE have LTE network contracts.
Ericsson says Indian 3G market will grow to 390 million users in 2020 from 70 million in 2013.
On the other hand, 2G subscriber base will decrease to 650 million from 715 million.
The growth of 3G and 4G subscriber base will be driven by smartphone growth that will surge to 520 million (45 percent of total phone base) in 2020 from 300 million in 2017 and 90 million (10 percent of phones) in 2013, Ericsson said.
Currently, mobile broadband data traffic is driven by social media 15 percent, browsing 11 percent, app / content downloads 11 percent, chat 7 percent and video 4 percent.
India’s total mobile subscriber base will grow from 795 million in 2013 to 1145 million subscribers by 2020.
The Ericsson report also focuses on the need for telecom investments by mobile operators to better customer experience.
Only a third of mobile subscribers can access internet over a mobile broadband network every time they attempt.
“Operators looking to effectively monetize broadband services and tap future growth opportunities need to significantly invest in scaling network performance in three areas – ensuring network ubiquity, consistent app coverage and new charging models based ‘personalization’ that address consumer’s specific preferences,” said Ajay Gupta, head of Strategy & Marketing, Ericsson India.
