The Indian Institute of Planning & Management, New Delhi
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These conditions create a highly competitive environment particularly for the pay VoIP market. However, in this highly lucrative industry; telecom service providers need to create a competitive advantage to become or stay successful. The Telecom sector in India exhibits the features of an oligopoly form of market structure. Key Features of Oligopoly •
A few firms selling similar product
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Each firm produces branded products
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Likely to be significant entry barriers into the market in the long run which allows firms to make supernormal profits.
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Interdependence between competing firms. Businesses have to take into account likely reactions of rivals to any change in price and output.
Major Players There are three types of players in telecom services: •
State owned companies (BSNL and MTNL)
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Private Indian owned companies (Reliance Infocomm, Tata Teleservices,)
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Foreign invested companies (Hutchison-Essar, Bharti Tele-Ventures, Escotel, Idea Cellular, BPL Mobile, Spice Communications)
1) The Indian Telecom sector is controlled by a few major players Bharti Airtel,
Vodafone (Earlier Hutch), Idea Cellular, BSNL, Tata Tele Services and Reliance Infocomm. Players like Bharti Airtel, Vodafone, Idea Cellular, regional players like Spice, Aircel, BPL, etc sell similar products SIM (Subscriber Identity Module) cards for mobile phones. They also provide Value Added Services such BATCH: PGP/SS/2009-11
ALUMNI ID NO.: DS/09/11-M-047