Indian telecom posted revenues of $27 billion in the calendar year 2012, said Himanshu Kapania, chairman of COAI and managing director of Idea Cellular.
$27 billion revenue is a meager 2.3 percent of the estimated global telecom revenue of $1.16 trillion, he said addressing the AGM of Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI).
Indian telecom market is inching towards the landmark figure of one billion mobile subscriptions by the year 2014.
The mobile subscriber base in India decreased to 867.02 million in April 2013 from 867.80 million in March 2013, registering a monthly growth of -0.09 percent, according to TRAI. The regulator said that the decline is largely due to disconnections by some of the service providers.
At the end of 2012, the India mobile subscriber base stood at 865 million and the country contributed over 13 percent of the global subscription base.
“In spite of its overweight, India is still a part of the unfinished growth story in global mobile telephony,” Kapania added.
Meanwhile, Himanshu Kapania and Marten Pieters, MD & CEO, Vodafone India, were re-elected as the chairman and vice-chairman, respectively, of the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) for the year 2013-14.
The chairman and vice chairman were elected unanimously by the AGM.
