- Saturday, April 20, 2024
By: Shubham Ghosh
BHARTI Airtel chief executive officer Gopal Vittal on Wednesday (4) said that a large country like India needs three private players in the telecom sector and hoped the government would take steps to offer relief to the industry that is under “serious financial stress”.
Vittal’s remarks were considered significant at a time when Vodafone Idea is desperately trying to survive. Aditya Birla Group chairman Kumar Mangalam Birla had in June offered to hand over the group’s stake in Vodafone Idea Ltd. To the government or any other identity.
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Speaking at the Q1 earnings’ call, Vittal said, “I think just from national perspective, it would be appropriate to see an industry structure where three players not just survive, but thrive and of course the government player is always there.”
“I feel as a country we do need three players…it is a large enough country with 1.3 billion people, which can easily accommodate three (private) players in this market,” he said.
Vittal said this while responding to an analyst’s query on how the company visualises the industry structure to be in the next one or two years and whether the Sunil Mittal-led telco is prepared for a two-player market.
“There is clearly a situation of serious financial stress in the industry and we have seen one of the players actually saying to the government that they may not be able to pay their dues coming up in March 2022. We hope that the government does something to provide some relief to the industry,” Vittal said.
Flagging the “extremely low” ARPU (average revenue per user) in the Indian telecom market, Vittal said the level needs to rise to Rs 200 ($2.7) and eventually Rs 300 ($4.04).
“As we have always said, ARPU in India is extremely low and at this level, our return on capital is in the low single digit. ARPU must rise first to (Rs) 200 and eventually to (Rs) 300,” Vittal said.
If ARPU rises, then industry repair can “certainly happen”, he noted.
“I would love to continue to see a three-player market… There are lots of jobs not just direct but indirect jobs, and there are many parts of the ecosystem which depend on industry for employment and livelihood,” he added.
(With PTI inputs)
