Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Saturday, Jun 18, 2005
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Saturday, Jun 18, 2005 |
|
|
|
|
|
Home Page
-
ISPs Info-Tech - Telecommunications VSNL dial-up Net subscriber base drops 24 pc Thomas K. Thomas
New Delhi , June 17 VIDESH Sanchar Nigam Ltd has lost 24 per cent of its dial-up Internet subscriber base during the last quarter ended March 2005. The Tata-managed company, which was the top Internet Service Provider a few years ago, has dropped to the fourth spot below the Chennai-based Sify. This comes even as the Internet segment is growing at 22 per cent annually. VSNL subscriber base had dipped from 9.3 lakh in December 2004 to just over seven lakh in March 2005. Sify, on the other hand, has moved up from 7.7 lakh to 8.1 lakh during the same period. The state-owned telecom majors Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd and Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd continue to be the top two ISPs with growth rate of 9.5 per cent and 6.6 per cent respectively. In fact, BSNL and MTNL account for nearly 50 per cent of the 5.55-million subscriber base. VSNL sources said the decline in dial-up subscriber base has happened on two accounts. First, due to a shift in consumer usage to high-speed Internet access such as broadband and, second, due to the removal of non-active subscribers, which takes place at the end of every financial year for the purpose of keeping the account books clean. VSNL, which had almost 70 per cent of the market a few years ago, now has just 13 per cent market share. The company's fortunes in the international long-distance segment have also been declining with competition from Reliance Infocomm, BSNL and Bharti taking away a significant chunk of the ILD traffic. The VSNL management has filed a suit against the Government seeking compensation for early introduction of competition, which it claims has affected its business drastically.
Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page
|
Stories in this Section |
|
The Hindu Group: Home | About Us | Copyright | Archives | Contacts | Subscription Group Sites: The Hindu | Business Line | The Sportstar | Frontline | The Hindu eBooks | The Hindu Images | Home |
Copyright © 2005, The
Hindu Business Line. Republication or redissemination of the contents of
this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of
The Hindu Business Line
|