Experts say Tier-II and Tier-III cities and smaller towns have a role to play in growth in smartphone sales. Mritunjay Kapur, managing director, Protiviti Consulting, said, "There is definitely a market in Tier-II, Tier-III and Tier-IV towns. Smartphones are fast becoming important as a business communication tool. This is especially true for sales people, and 'fleet-on-the-street'," he said.
In a big setback to Aditya Birla Group firm Idea Cellular, the Delhi High Court said the six licences of Spice Communications would not be transferred to Idea, since the company did not comply with the licence and merger guidelines. The court also slapped a fine of Rs 1 crore for hiding information.
Indian telecommunications companies are ringing louder. Bharti Airtel and Reliance Communications are among the big league of gloal telecom companies.
Idea Cellular has over 68 million mobile subscribers and has operations in most of the circles across the country.
Aditya Birla Group company Idea Cellular today said it expects to start 3G services in the third quarter of the ongoing fiscal.
According to sources, Idea Cellular has agreed to provide interconnection to RCom thereby not becoming a part of Cellular Operators' Association of India's likely petition against Trai's directive on the same. Besides, other operators to provide interconnectivity to RCom GSM network are Aircel and Spice Communication.
The department of telecommunications has raised questions about the merger between Idea Cellular and Spice Telecom violating key clauses on intra-circle merger and mobile licence conditions.
Idea Cellular, an Aditya Birla group company, is investing around Rs 647 crore (Rs 6.47 billion) for the rollout of operations in the Mumbai circle. The operations are expected to commence in two months time.
Aditya Birla group firm Idea Cellular on Monday made an open offer to the shareholders of Spice Communications for acquiring additional 20 per cent stake in the telecom services provider for about Rs 1,066.63 crore (Rs 10.66 billion).
Aditya Birla Telecom Ltd (ABTL), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Idea Cellular, will offload 20 per cent to Providence Equity Partners, a US buyout firm, for Rs 2,560 crore. This takes Providence's total investment in Idea Cellular to $1.04 billion, which is the largest private equity investment in an Indian telecom service provider. The deal values ABTL at Rs 12,800 crore.
Birla group firm Idea Cellular Ltd and Modis-owned Spice Telecom on Friday dared the government to allocate spectrum to those mobile operators who submitted applications after them.
The government on Thursday issued 22 more licenses to new players, including Idea Cellular and realty major Unitech, a move that would bring in competition and lower mobile tariffs.
Tatas agreed to a joint venture, competed with it, later walked out and are now filing 'frivolous' petitions against it, Birlas told Supreme Court in reply to Tata Industries' plea for arbitration on mobile firm Idea Cellular.
A team of Telekom Malaysia officials will meet US-based billionaire B K Modi and officials of Idea Cellular in Mumbai on Friday, a top official at Spice Communications said. Another option is to permit Telekom Malaysia raise its stake in Spice Communications to 74 per cent. Even though, Idea Cellular will have no role to play in this deal, the Modi family will sell around 14 per cent stake and retain a 26 per cent stake.
Idea Cellular's bid to acquire a controlling stake in the B K Modi-promoted Spice Communications has hit a pricing roadblock. Investment banking sources said that B K Modi had asked for Rs 70 a share for his 40.8 per cent stake in Spice, valuing the company at Rs 4,829.47 crore, but Idea is reluctant to pay that much."Any price valuing Spice Communications beyond Rs 4,200 crore would be expensive for Idea Cellular," said an analyst with a domestic brokerage.
It emerges that Vi has probably offered good data quality despite being short on spectrum and infrastructure due to its stretched finances. Did the two companies that merged face the heat due to price wars? Probably. Did the government's tough stance in demanding its "due" share of telecom revenues hurt the company? Certainly!
Anil Ambani-controlled Reliance Communications has entered into an agreement with GSM service providers Hutchison-Essar and the Aditya Birla-controlled Idea Cellular to share passive infrastructure for cell sites.
Reliance Jio saw fall in speeds from 7.2 mbps in September to 6 mbps in October, according to CLSA report.
In the broader market, the BSE Midcap index bucked the trend to gain 0.3%
The Ruias of Essar have rejected an offer by the Aditya Birla group's Idea Cellular to acquire BPL Mobile's Mumbai circle, which lost heavily on its valuations due to the corporate battle between its shareholders.
Telecom complaints against other players were below 500 in the first half of 2016.
Idea Cellular, the fifth largest mobile operator in the country with around 15 million subscribers, is believed to be on the verge of clinching a cash-cum-equity buyout of Spice Telecom that values the latter at around $1 billion.
While Vodafone will hold 45.1% of the shares in the new entity, to be renamed at a later stage, Kumar Mangalam Birla and other promoters of Idea group will hold 26%. Vodafone India will also transfer 4.9% of its shareholding to Idea's promoters for a cash consideration of Rs 38.74 lakh crores.
The company has purchased the rights to use the 1,800 MHz spectrum in 6 circles.
Swedish equipment supplier on Monday said it has bagged a major contract to provide technology -- Ericsson Mobile Organiser -- to Idea cellular enabling its subscribers to surf e-mail facility on their cell phones.
India's third largest telecom operator Idea Cellular joined the data tariff war by slashing 2G mobile internet rates by 90 per cent and 3G tariffs by 30 per cent for six months from November 15.
Idea Cellular has launched a special mobile phone plan for women featuring emergency talk time of up to Rs 25 to a pre-determined number and three emergency safety alerts via short code - enabling users to alert three contacts for help.
The Department of Telecom has worked out a one-time spectrum charge of over Rs 2,060 crore to be levied from operators for the period they remained in business after their licences were cancelled in February last year, sources said.
Denial of interconnection "appears to be with ulterior motive to stifle competition and is anti consumer", Trai said.
Idea Cellular, an unlisted cellular company, will invest over Rs 1200 crore (Rs 12 billion) for network capacity expansion and coverage during the current fiscal for eight circles.
Idea Cellular on Tuesday said it would be investing upto Rs 1,300 crore (Rs 13 billion)
The auction is the biggest ever sale of 2G and 3G airwaves.
Telecom regulatory authority of India on Tuesday asked Bharti and Idea Cellular to refund migration charges to their respective mobile subscribers.
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