Telcos' gross revenues dip 1.36% in Q2 FY22

The gross revenue (GR) of telecom service providers (TSP) declined by 1.36 percent on a year-on-year (YoY) basis to $900 in the July-September 2021 quarter, according to a Trai report released on Monday.  

TSPs posted gross revenue of $9 million in the same quarter a year ago, according to Trai’s performance indicator report for the July-September 2021 quarter.  

The “Indian Telecom Services Performance Indicator Report” noted that GR increased by 3.86 percent and adjusted gross revenue (AGR) rose by 4.24 percent in the quarter ending in September 2021, compared to the previous quarter.  

Bharti Airtel, Jio, and Vodafone Idea, who access service providers and provide services to consumers, accounted for 78 percent and 79 percent of GR.  

The AGR component of the telecom operators, on which the government imposes charges, increased by 17.07 percent marking $7 million during the reported quarter from $ 6 million in the corresponding period of 2020.  

It is worth mentioning that telephone subscribers in India decreased from 1,202.57 million at the end of Jun 2021 to 1,189.15 million by the end of September 2021, registering a decline rate of 1.12 percent over the previous quarter.   

Those statistics indicate a YoY growth rate of 1.75 percent over the same quarter of the last year, while the overall Tele-density in India decreased from 88.07 percent in quantitative easing (QE) on June 2021 to 86.89 percent as in QE in September 2021.  

On its part, Reliance Jio reported the highest AG revenue of $249 during the reported quarter, followed by Bharti Airtel with $ 199, Vodafone Idea with $85, BSNL with $ 26, Tata Teleservices with $7.5, and MTNL with $4.49.  

The Indian government’s revenue from telecom services came in the form of license fees, spectrum usage charges (SUC) increased by 16.8 percent and 19.99 percent, respectively. Telephone subscribers in urban areas decreased from 666.10 million by the end of June 2021 to 659.09 million by end of September 2021. Urban Tele-density also fell from 140.86 percent to 138.72 percent during that same period.  

On the other hand, rural telephone subscribers decreased from 536.47 million by the end of June to 530.06 million by the end of September.