JIOPHONE WEIGHS ON AIRTEL’S USER BASE

Bharti Airtel has said it came under pressure with the launch of Reliance Jio’s feature phones. Airtel Chief Executive Gopal Vittal said it was impacted with the advent of Jiophone as Airtel’s feature phone customers made the shift. “There was pressure,” Vittal said in a post-earnings call.

During Dussehra and Diwali, Jio made its phone available at a price of ~699, against the earlier price of ~1,500.

Airtel’s Chief Financial Officer Badal Bagri said the company’s focus on quality customers and prudent tariff tweaks helped improve the average revenue per user (ARPU) in the September quarter. Airtel on Tuesday reported 28 per cent jump in its ARPU at ~128 for the September quarter, driven mainly by the increased data customer base.

The company had posted an ARPU of ~100 in the corresponding period of the last financial year (2018-19). However, on a sequential basis, the company’s ARPU remained flat — from ~129 in June 2019.

Data usage per customer rose 42.2 per cent year-on-year, to 13,116 megabytes. ARPU is the total revenue of the operator divided by the number of users. Revenue from mobile services was ~10,811.8 crore in the three months ended September, up 7.4 per cent from ~10,070.4 crore in the same peri

od, last financial year. In the June quarter, Airtel’s India mobile revenue stood at ~10,724 crore. Subscriber base grew to 279.43 million in the September quarter, from 276.81 million in the preceding quarter.

Airtel said on Tuesday it had deferred announcing its financial results for the September quarter from October 29 to November 14, as it awaits clarity on the Supreme Court (SC) verdict. It is also approaching the Department of Telecommunications (DOT) to seek clarity on the total amount involved. According to the DOT, Airtel faces a liability of around ~42,000 crore after including licence fees and spectrum usage charges.