GUWAHATI: With Vodafone Idea and Bharti Airtel deciding to switch off low Arpu (average realisation per user) subscribers — those who spend less than Rs 35 a month — from their network, roughly 250 million 2G users stand to lose their mobile connection.
Currently, while Bharti has about 100 million users who are below Rs 35 a month bracket, for Vodafone Idea the number is higher at around 150 million. While Bharti has come out with seven pan-India plan beginning at Rs 35, Vodafone has come out with five plans where also the lowest re-charge is Rs 35 a month.
Another reason for the companies to switch of low paying 2G users is that the companies want to shut down their 2G networks and move the subscribers to 4G. For low paying subscribers the option for operators is either to compete with Jio’s Rs 500 4G feature phone which is a costly proposition or focus on high paying customers by moving them to 4G bundled plans which also improves their Arpus.
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“We have about 330 million customers in wireless, but if you look at the pattern of consumption across the base you will find that there is a very large number of customers, some of whom we acquired from Telenor and some that we have ourselves, about 100 million customers with very low levels of Arpu. So, these Arpus are sort of low double-digit,” Bharti Airtel CEO and managing director (India & South Asia) Gopal Vittal said.
