VRock Gets Interim Order Against RCOM For IPL4 VAS

Hot News is hot again: VRock mobile has obtained an interim order from the Delhi High Court, which restricts the provisioning of SMS and Interactive Voice Response (IVR; voice portal) services being provided by Reliance Communications to customers, for the Indian Premier League (IPL). The order was obtained ex-parte; Justice V. K. Jain, upon hearing arguments from the plaintiff (vRock) said that an interim permission will be granted to Reliance Communications, subject to making a provisional payment of 25% of revenue earned so far by providing value added services related to IPL 4, and continuing to pay 25% of revenue earned, and subject to the same terms and conditions since vRock has agreed upon with Tata Indicom. If Reliance Communications doesn’t approach vRock for this deal, then there is an injunction preventing it from providing SMS and IVR services. Season four of the IPL is expected to end by May 28th, and the court took into account that the matter needs to be heard at the earliest. MediaNama was present at the hearing.
Explaining the concept of Hot News, Pravin Anand, representing vRock Mobile, pointed out that news such as Cricket scores is time sensitive, and while it is in outside the realm of copyright, it is a case of quasi-property; IPL has a limited timeframe. Additionally, he said that Reliance Communications (RCOM) cannot deny that the rights to Cricket scores via SMS and IVR exist, since it had itself entered into commercial negotiations with vRock for the very same rights for the ICC Cricket World Cup; talks had ended when an agreement over the amount to be paid to RCOM for the rights could not be reached. RCOM, as we had reported earlier, had acquired all mobile rights for the ICC Cricket World Cup. vRock also disclosed that it has paid Rs. 65 crore ($14.5 million) for a period of 5 years for the rights.
Please note that this is an interim order, issued ex-parte, which means that Reliance Communications was not represented.
Implications
One immediate implication of this is that RCOM will have to disclose revenue earned from providing these services to the court, if it does tie up vRock, else it will have to stop its SMS and IVR services. Secondly, the question of who owns the right to provide Cricket scores, even if for commercial purposes, lends itself to a larger debate of whether information of a public event is a case of quasi-property, and the organizer has ownership of this information. Remember that the owner of the event controls access to it. source

Reliance Communications brings in Next-Generation Mobile Internet Services with Cisco Technology

Cisco today announced the completion of a new mobile network for Reliance Communications that will cover 100,000 square kilometers -- the largest 3G deployment in India. With this new network, Reliance customers will be able to experience new mobile services such as high-quality video telephony and high-speed mobile data, along with enhanced music downloads, instant messaging and online gaming.

Reliance’s new mobile architecture, which includes the Cisco ASR 5000, Cisco 7600 and Cisco ME 3800X Series routers, will enable Reliance to develop and deliver, on a large scale, highly personalized and customized mobile multimedia services with superior quality and reliability.


The deployment also paves the way for Reliance’s implementation of the recently announced Cisco® MOVE (Monetization, Optimization, Videoscape Experience) framework. Cisco’s MOVE empowers mobile operators like Reliance to better manage, enhance and take financial advantage of the rapidly growing volume of mobile data traffic.
Key Facts / Highlights

• The Cisco ASR 5000 is a purpose-built mobile multimedia core platform featuring a high-performance distributed architecture, service assurance and subscriber awareness. The ASR 5000 uniquely combines high capacity, high availability, and powerful performance with subscriber and network intelligence.
  
• The Cisco ME 3800X Series Carrier Ethernet Switch Router is a converged, full-featured aggregation platform purposely designed for the mobile, business, and residential markets. With low power consumption and high service scale, this 1-rack-unit (1RU) switch router is optimized for small aggregation and remote point-of-presence (POP) applications making it a highly cost effective option.
  
• The Cisco 7600 Series Internet Router delivers high-performance wide- and metropolitan-area network (WAN and MAN) capabilities with high-touch IP services at the network edge. Now, service providers can "service enable" their networks at optical speeds, providing a competitive advantage and service differentiation. The Cisco 7600 Series helps servce providers break through service and bandwidth barriers to increase revenues and profits.

Prashant Gokarn, head, 3G business, Reliance Communications said, “With the advent of 3G, we are experiencing high demand for data and video services. We will be offering a wide range of feature-rich services to our consumers, including video calling, mobile TV, video streaming and applications accessed at superfast speeds at affordable tariffs on our best-in-class 3G wireless network. Cisco’s comprehensive IP product and solutions portfolio provides us the intelligence and performance required to customize and optimize each segment of our network, deploying what we need, where we need it, when we need it, all while enhancing our customers’ experience.”
Vish Iyer, vice president, of Cisco’s Service Provider business unit said, "This pioneering deployment of a comprehensive IP mobile architecture by Reliance is a significant breakthrough and will elevate the subscriber experience and also provide a rich suite of monetization and optimization features that ensure lower costs per bit. The radio-independent IP-based mobile backhaul and packet core infrastructure will offer pre-eminent traffic capacity and operating efficiency, making a strong foundation for Reliance to meet the current and future needs of its customers and to get ready for the global growth of the next-generation mobile Internet."source

Nokia join hands with Reliance to provide Ovi Store content

Mobile handset manufacturer Nokia today entered into a partnership with telecom service providerReliance Communications to provide the exclusive excess to Nokia's Ovi Store. 

Reliance Communications consumers can now exclusively access the plethora of 'paid-for' content available on the Ovi Store, through integrated operator billing, for a three month period, the company said in a statement. 

The amount will be either included in their monthly mobile phone bills or deducted from the pre-paid balance, as per their data plans. 

The Ovi Store supports the widest range of content and file types including applications, games, videos, podcasts, productivity tools, web and location-based services and much more.source

Ambani questioned over telecom scam (AFP)

 Indian telecom tycoon Anil Ambani met police investigators on Wednesday to answer questions over a suspected mobile licensing fraud that robbed the government of billions of dollars.

Ambani's Reliance ADA group, which controls India's second-biggest mobile group Reliance Communications, said the visit by the billionaire to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) headquarters in New Delhi was voluntary.

"No summons of any kind has been issued by the CBI," the Reliance statement said.

Ambani, India's fourth-richest man with an estimated $13.7 billion fortune, according to Forbes, met CBI officials "to clarify ongoing issues relating to telecom matters", the group said.

The CBI would not immediately comment on Ambani's visit in connection with the widening police probe into the alleged fraud, one of the biggest corruption cases in Indian history that has badly damaged the Congress-led government which is also battling a slew of other scandals.

Television channels showed the 51-year-old Ambani leaving the CBI offices mobbed by TV crews.

Reliance ADA Group has denied any wrongdoing over the second-generation (2G) licensing scandal in which the government sold mobile licences at knockdown prices in 2008.

Ambani's CBI appearance came after the group said last weekend police had questioned several of its officials over alleged irregularities in the awarding of licences.

The industrialist's CBI visit came after Premier Manmohan Singh earlier Wednesday, in a rare media roundtable, defended himself against accusations of "inaction" in fighting corruption and vowed anyone found guilty would be punished.

The national auditor said late last year irregularities in awarding the sought-after licences cost the public exchequer up to $40 billion in lost revenues.

The CBI is looking into companies which may have benefited from suspected rigging of licence bidding rules under then telecom minister A. Raja and whether kickbacks were paid.

Raja was arrested with two former aides earlier this month in the scandal along with a senior executive of one of India's biggest real estate firms DB Realty which has a joint telecoms venture with Abu Dhabi's Etisalat.

The police agency has not alleged that any of the Reliance ADA Group firms profited from the scam.

It has, however, named India's Swan Telecom -- now known as Etisalat DB Telecom -- and India's second-largest listed real estate Unitech as allegedly having benefited. Unitech has joint telecom venture with Norway's Telenor.

The government auditor accused Reliance Communications, through its Reliance Telecom unit, of violating licensing rules by holding over 10 percent of rival Swan Telecom when it applied for a licence.

However, Reliance said on Wednesday no Reliance group company "held even a single share in Swan Telecom Ltd at the time of granting of the 2G licence."

All individuals and companies being probed have denied any wrongdoing.source

IndiaTimes join hands with Reliance for WorldCup

The rights, bagged from Reliance Communication Limited, include mobile content services including all the needed services like SMS , voice & video alerts, live audio commentary, mobile content downloads and 2G and 3G.

Mahesh Prasad the president of Reliance communication said that, Indiatimes had an absolute and broad network services on 58888 and had the largest collection of infotainment content, it was therefore a strong natural choice for them distribution partnership. He added that they believe that with media strength alongside, Times would bring great value to the mobile subscribers.

Commenting on Reliance Mobile’s association with ICC Cricket World Cup 2011, Mr. Anil Pande, Head VAS, Reliance Communications said that, as ICC's 'Global Partner' till 2015 they were honored to be associated with the game that was gaining popularity across the World.

CBI questions brass of 9 telcos

NEW DELHI: CBI has accelerated its task of identifying the main beneficiaries of the 2G scam , masterminded by former Telecom Minister A Raja , ahead of the March 1 deadline set by the Supreme Court. Senior functionaries of S-Tel and Unitech, Loop Telecom, Swan Telecom and Reliance Communications have been questioned about their role in the scam in the last few days. 


The investigating agency has already conducted one round of examining of officials of all 9 telecom companies which were conferred the 2G licences in 2008, and is in the process of interrogating them again. According to CBI, the charges against the companies which were awarded a total of 122 licences across 22 circles in 2008, fall broadly in three categories. They are, violation of the first-come-first-served policy, tampering of cut-off date for licences and failure to meet the eligibility criteria. The charges against most companies fall under any of the three categories or more. 


In its status report before the apex court last week, CBI described it as multiple-conspiracies. CBI had last week arrested DB Realty promoter and Swan (now called Etisalat DB) director Shahid Balwa in connection with the scam. The prosecution claimed that Balwa had entered into a conspiracy with some private companies to cause a loss to the exchequer. The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India in its report last November said priority lists in Punjab and Maharashtra were tweaked to benefit Swan in spectrum allocation. 


In the same report , CAG had alleged that S-Tel was not eligible for getting six mobile permits . The national auditor found that the company had submitted false certificate from the company secretary. S-Tel Chief Operating Officer Shamik Das said CBI had asked for information from all companies who got licences in 2008 and there were no specific charges against the company. He said the company had for its interaction with CBI sent its official representative. 


A Unitech spokeswoman said pursuant to the Supreme Court order, all the 9 telecom companies which received the licenses were being questioned by the agencies and was not specific to any one company. Unitech is a responsible corporate, functioning within the guidelines prescribed by the government and has been fully co-operating with the investigating agency, she said. 


RCOM CEO Wireless Syed Safawi said CBI was reportedly examining a large number of telecom companies and their officials from across the entire telecom industry in relation to various matters for 2001-2008 . “We are fully co-operating with the authorities in this regard, and will continue to extend all assistance as required to enable them to complete their investigations ,’’ he said.source

Travelling Numbers

Almost all mobile service brands say the much anticipated and much delayed mobile number portability is not going to be a game changer in their industry. And yet, not one of them is holding back on doing their best — in effort and expenses — to get subscribers to port from competing service brands best — in effort and expenses — to get subscribers to port from competing service brands to their own.

Idea Cellular started advertising before the launch of MNP in November 2010. By now, there is a communication deluge as MNP cuts across India. Leading players such as Airtel and Vodafone have gone aggressive across TV, print, radio, outdoor, at points of sale and online.

Newer entrants Uninor and MTS have been advertising over the past two months or so. To Idea’s celebrity endorser Abhishek Bachchan, Airtel has roped in AR Rahman, Shah Rukh Khan, Saif Ali Khan and Kareena Kapoor.

Vodafone has a TV ad featuring a kiddie photo session and hoardings welcoming subscribers to much better services and quality without changing their mobile numbers.

And riding on the din, though perhaps not specifically MNP-driven, is Videocon with its zero-paisa per second call offer — for the period of one year — on its TV ad and outdoor media.

So is it much ado about nothing?

Mritunjay Kapur, MD, Protiviti Consulting India (Protiviti is an international risk management and business consulting group), said, “Because one brand is doing it, others are also doing it. It’s a very competitive market.”  With as many as 15 mobile service brands fighting for business, no one would miss out on any action, not even in a market with a subscriber base as large as 75.22 crore as on December 31, 2010, according to Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) figures.

Atul Bindal, president, mobile services, Bharti Airtel, said, “Pre-paid subscriptions make up 95% of the total mobile customer base in India. With already very high monthly pre-paid churn at around 7%, MNP will have very small impact at an industry level.”

Samaresh Parida, director, corporate strategy, Vodafone Essar, said, “In most countries where MNP has been launched, the action mostly lasted over three-four months, by which time subscribers settled down with the service of their choice.”

However, port-outs and port-ins are happening with every service, big and small. “We have seen 2,17,000 port-ins and 1,25,000 port-outs,” said Parida.

While attractive price deals are very visible, the bigger players insist that low pricing cannot be a sole driver for MNP movement. “We find customers changing operators due to network issues. Our research also indicates that they are switching operators because of service and not pricing issues,” Bindal said.

But, he added, “the possibility of ongoing tactical promotional offers at the local level cannot be ignored. As prices in India are already very low, there is no further scope for a sustainable price drop. With MNP launch, all existing operators will be working on improving their quality of services — network, customer service, products.”

“Customers responding to MNP are making more considered choices. Their requests are on network quality, service, brand strength and also tariffs,” Parida observed.

Rajat Mukarji, chief corporate affairs officer, Idea Cellular, said, “Consumers, our research shows, are looking for a pan-India network offering seamless connectivity; affordable, relevant products and service offerings; accessible and humane customer care; accurate billing systems; voice clarity; and no call drops. These are the key parameters for satisfaction and will ultimately be the deciding factors for exercising choice, post MNP. These were the highlights on our ad campaign, with its key message, ‘No Idea, Get Idea’.”

Newer operators are, however, more upbeat on the mix of attractive pricing and less cluttered networks since their subscriber bases are smaller.

“We expect MNP to boost our subscriber base. January-November 2010 TRAI numbers show that 14% of incremental subscribers were brought in by new operators. Post MNP, 60% of our port-ins were GSM consumers. The new operators received licences at varied intervals between 2008 and 2009, so their achievement is even more significant,” said Leonid Musatov, chief marketing officer, MTS India, which offers CDMA services.

Olav Sande, EVP, western circle, Uninor India, said dynamic pricing has worked wonderfully for Uninor. “We see MNP as an excellent opportunity to grow. In itself, MNP is not a basic need. The basic need is the attractiveness of the plan in terms of price and the services we offer on that plan,” he said.

Every mobile service brand wants the high ARPU (average revenue per user) subscriber — who is mostly a post-paid customer — but is not averse to lower revenue customers too.

Parida explained, “Naturally, I would give higher priority to my high ARPU customer. Below that, based on usage segmentation, I would offer different services to different customer sets.”

Airtel’s Bindal was more direct: “We remain focused on delivering complete ‘value’ as against offering just the price proposition. We hope to acquire few customers in the category of deal seekers that keep switching operators depending upon ‘offer of the day’ schemes. Our early analysis indicates that among MNP port-ins, Airtel is getting disproportionate share of high value customers from other operators.”

Does MNP impact anything then? Protiviti’s Kapur concluded, “It gives consumers choice. It puts greater pressure on mobile service operators to improve their products, services and quality. Overall, MNP can create better balance in overall deliveries. Consumers gain.”source

Analysts are not recommending Airtel, Idea and Reliance.

Despite a sharp fall in telecom share prices, analysts are not recommending Bharti Airtel, Idea Cellular and Reliance Communications to investors. Following the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India's (TRAI) recommendation of a steep hike in 2G spectrum pricing, wherein telecom companies have to shell out additional Rs 16000 crore to the government, the telecom stock prices took a severe beating. The telecom stocks were one of the biggest losers on Thursday's trade.

According to analysts, no fresh buying is recommended at the current level. With an estimated price earning ratio (PE ratio) of 26.1x in FY11, Idea is recommended for sell. For Bharti Airtel, investors can hold on with an estimated PE of 20.4x, as suggested by Emkay Share.

“Telecom companies would not agree to the re-pricing proposal by TRAI. The proposal does not seem reasonable. Unless there is clarity on the re-pricing issue, no fresh entry is recommended. Market has already factored in the re-pricing issue. However, there could be further down falls based on the final outcome,” said an analyst on condition of anonymity.

TRAI has sent a final recommendation for re-pricing of 2G spectrum. This was a further intimation to recommendations made in May 2010 for re-pricing of spectrum above 6.2Mhz. Re-pricing is recommended for the remaining period (7 years) of spectrum at the price discovered in auction of 3G spectrum.

If implemented then it would erode profitability of Bharti and Idea with yearly outgo of Rs 580 crore and Rs 230 crore, respectively for 7 years. Cost for Reliance Communication is expected to remain miniscule at Rs 2 crore, according the Emkay research note.

Shares of Bharti and Idea ended at Rs 322.80, down 2.81%, Rs 65, down 1.89% respectively. RCom, however, was at Rs 96.25, up 1.69% at the close of day’s trading on NSE. The stock prices Bharti Airtel, RCom and Idea have corrected 15% on an average in last one month.source

Top 10 Operators in INDIA 2011

Top 10 Mobile service Providers in India 2011

List Of Mobile Phone Service Providers in India: 

Below You can find the list of Mobile Service Providers and their Market Shares

	Operator	Subscriber base	Market Share
1	Bharti Airtel	146,293,078	21.34%
2	Reliance Communications	119,351,438	17.37%
3	Vodafone	118,038,438	17.08%
4	BSNL	80,739,935	11.31%
5	Tata Teleservices	80,817,298	11.47%
6	Idea	76,023,551	10.84%
7	Aircel	47,519,629	6.64%
8	Unitech	13,748,300	1.05%
9	Loop	3,009,445	0.45%
10	Sistema	7,121,765	0.86%
11	MTNL	5,342,039	0.81%
12	Videocon	5,616,152	0.43%
13	Stel	1,867,060	0.22%
14	Etisalat	70,829	0.01%
15	HFCL Infotel	1,132,477	0.13%
	All India	706,691,164	100.00%

Top 10 Mobile Service Providers in India:

1	Bharti Airtel
2	Vodafone
3	Idea
4	BSNL
5	Aircel
6	Tata Serviceable
7	Reliance Communications
8	MTNL
9	Unitech
10	Loop

State wise Mobile Phone Subscribers: 

	State	Subscriber base	Population (01/08/2010)	Mobile phones per 1000 population
1	Uttar Pradesh	92,867,835	199,415,992	427
2	Maharashtra	84,543,727	110,351,688	707
3	Tamil Nadu	63,671,528	67,773,611	881
4	Andhra Pradesh	54,000,379	84,241,069	600
5	West Bengal	51,901,967	90,524,849	520
6	Bihar	46,311,291	97,560,027	430
7	Karnataka	43,802,688	58,969,294	709
8	Gujarat	40,158,662	58,388,625	618
9	Rajasthan	38,649,784	67,449,102	535
10	Madhya Pradesh	38,295,896	72,362,313	489
	India	706,691,164	1,188,783,351	580