Bharti Airtel released their Q1, ending June 3, 2013 indicates very interesting pattern as against the competitors. Most of the incumbent and regional telecom service providers are vouching for more subscriber additions whereas Airtel Subscriber base increased from 187.3 Mn to 190.94 Mn YoY achieving mere subscriber growth of 1.9%. The slow subscriber addition in recent quarter attracted lots of criticism by strategist, analyst and even questioned Airtel competitiveness slippage as against other incumbent telecom players. Interestingly for readers, Airtel voice APRU increased from 154 INR to 166 INR Y-o-Y achieving healthy 7% growth whereas Total ARPU increased from 185 INR to 200 INR Y-o-Y achieving even better growth rates of 8%. On the data side, Airtel data user jumped to 46 plus million user which also includes 6.8 Mn 3G subscribers clocking data APRU of 63 INR. The QoQ data APRU growth rate is 14%. I have been reading lots of negative news about Bharti Airtel ability to redefine their cost efficient oriented growth chart but today result clearly indicate Bharti Airtel strategy to strengthen their Indian operation while competitor enjoy Airtel ongoing concern on Africa front. Analysts were too impressed about Vodafone India ARPU of 193INR, I believe that analysts must appreciate Airtel what they achieved on ARPU side in very difficult regulatory and economic conditions rather than focusing on their debt levels, financing cost and Africa. In my point of view, Airtel is huge cash generation and improving EBITA level is going to help them to sail through their debt issues
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