Reliance Jio adds active users at cost to Airtel, Vi’s 2G base

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Key Points

Reliance Jio is the only telco to add active mobile users in August 2023 while its nearest rivals Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea (Vi) suffered losses on this score, latest customer data put out by the telecom regulator showed...

This underlined the telecom market leader had taken away a chunk of its older rivals 2G users amid the rising demand for its budget internet-enabled feature phone Jio Bharat, analysts said.. Telecom Regulatory Authority of Indias (Trai) data showed Jio added 1.2 million active users, taking its August active user base to 417 million..

By contrast, Airtel and Vi lost 0.4 million and 2.9 million such users, shrinking their active user bases to 376 million and 199 million respectively...

The combined active user losses of Vi and Airtel, though, dragged the telecom sectors overall active user base, which fell by 3.1 million in August to 1,043 million after eight successive months of growth, as per the latest Trai data...

State-run Bharat Sanchar Nigams wired broadband user base was virtually unchanged at 3.7 million, underlining its inability to compete effectively with Jio and Airtel...

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