Crisil Ratings said that a total of 20-25 million subscribers are already using 5G technology in India
About a third of wireless data users in India, or 300 million subscribers, are expected to use 5G services by March 2025, according to a recent report by local Crisil Ratings.
Crisil Ratings, which is owned by S&P Global, also estimated that a total of 20-25 million subscribers are already using 5G services in the Asian nation.
Naveen Vaidyanathan, director at Crisil Ratings, said: “Currently, about 30-35% of the 150-170 million smartphones shipped in India annually are 5G enabled. While the share of 5G smartphones shipments will improve gradually, still low initial value proposition and high cost of the gadget versus a 4G phone would restrict overall 5G adoption to nearly 300 million users by fiscal 2025. This would mean only a third of the data users in the country will be plugging into 5G services by fiscal 2025.”
The report also stated that subscribers of 5G services will stimulate data consumption as they upgrade to higher data packs for better speeds, which will drive up overall average revenue per user (ARPU) and return metrics for telecommunication companies.
“India is already one of the highest data-consuming countries. 5G could accelerate adoption of over-the-top streaming services and online gaming, which would drive data demand further. Consequently, average data usage per subscriber per month is expected to rise to 28-30 GB by fiscal 2025 from 20 GB at present,” said Rounak Agarwal, team leader at Crisil Ratings.
Local carrier Bharti Airtel recently confirmed that its Airtel 5G Plus service is available to customers in over 270 cities in the country.
Earlier this month, Airtel announced it had reached 10 million 5G subscribers across India, with 1 million 5G subscribers in Mumbai alone. Airtel, which had initially started offering 5G in October 2022, had reached 1 million 5G customers across its entire network in November last year.
The company’s CEO, Gopal Vittal, recently said that Bharti Airtel aims to provide 5G services in 300 cities across the country by March next year.
The executive also said that Airtel would use its 5G services to bolster its high-value postpaid business. To achieve this, Airtel has already identified the top 150 cities that represent 40% of the domestic mobile market.
In October 2022, Bharti Airtel initially aunched 5G services in Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Siliguri, Nagpur and Varanasi.
Reliance Jio Infocomm recently announced that its 5G network already reaches 406 cities across India.
Jio is offering the 5G connectivity on an invitational basis, with users living in 5G-enabled cities who have 5G compatible smartphones receiving invitations.
The telco had initially announced the launch of the beta trial of its 5G services in Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata and Varanasi in October 2022. Jio is offering 5G through a Standalone (SA) network architecture.
