The CDMA major has won the maximum number of clusters - 50 — for offering mobile services in rural areas under the amended USO Fund scheme.
NEW DELHI: Reliance Communications, the Anil Ambani-controlled code division multiple access (CDMA) major, has won the maximum number of clusters - 50 — for offering mobile services in rural areas under the amended Universal Service Obligation (USO) Fund scheme.
Close on the heels is Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) with 49 clusters, followed by Hutch Essar (now Vodafone Essar) with 32, Reliance Telecom (the GSM operator of the Anil Ambani group) 30, Idea Cellular 28, Bharti Airtel 13 and Aircel along with Dishnet Wireless 8.
Interestingly, most of these operators put negative bids, which means that they would pay to the government, rather than receive subsidy from the USO Fund.
Mobile operators are looking for opportunity in rural areas as the current rural teledensity in India is less than 3%, against the overall teledensity of 18.26%.
A cluster represents anything from 14 to over 100 cell sites. A total of 7,871 cell sites across rural India were up for grabs for mobile operators in the recent USO tender, which was issued in two parts.
BSNL had emerged on top with maximum clusters in part A, to set up passive infrastructure in rural India.
While results of Part A of the tender for setting up passive infrastructure were announced a few days ago, the bids for Part B (for licensed operators to offer mobile services) were opened on Monday. The final results for Part B of the tender are yet to be announced.
BSNL had emerged the topper in Part A of the tender for setting up passive infrastructure, having won in 63 out of the 81 clusters. Of the private players, the Hutch Essar joint venture, Reliance Communications Infrastructure Ltd, GTL Infrastructure and Nitel won four clusters each.
Quipo Telecom Infarstructure won one cluster. In the remaining one cluster, there would be rebidding due to a tie.
The selected players, as per their bid amounts and other factors, would get government subsidy under the amended USO Fund over the next five years for setting up telecom infrastructure and offering services in rural areas.
However, in the case of negative bidders, they would pay to the government. The negative bids are up to over Rs 2 lakh a year.
While only one operator has been selected per cluster for setting up infrastructure, three per cluster have been chosen for offering services.
Tthe growth in overall teledensity has been due to the increasing mobile subscriber numbers. Of the total 202.74 million telephone users in India, 162.53 million are mobile subscribers.
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