ISLAMABAD, Jan 7: The cellular industry of Pakistan has shown an exceptional annual growth of 119 percent during 2000-07 in terms of subscribers. With over 74 million of subscriber base, the cellular industry (over the last 2years) has witnessed an average addition of more than two million subscribers in a month.

The cellular teledensity of about 47 percent is the main contributor to the overall teledensity of around 51 percent in the country. Mobilink is a leading cellular market player, followed by Ufone – 100 percent owned cellular subsidiary of PTCL (Etisalat group co.).  The rising interest in Pakistan’s fast growing cellular industry is evident from the acquisition of Paktel (89 percent shares) by China Mobile (CM Pak) at an enterprise value (EV) of USD460 million, and Warid Telecom (30 percent share) by Singapore Telecommunications Ltd (SingTel) for EV of USD 2.9 billion.

CM Pak’s aggressive future strategy on Pakistan market can be well gauged by its initial launch of USD700 million cellular expansion plans, which will be followed by an estimated investment of USD400 million/year in Pakistan, said market analyst.

Mobilink, Ufone and Telenor, the market leaders in terms of cellular subs., have their parents’ companies listed in Egypt, Pakistan and Norway, respectively.

Mobilink having already injected more than USD 2.5 billion in the Telecom sector of Pakistan, plans to invest more in coming years. Mobilink’s 6,500km optic fiber backbone with further expansion planned for 2,000km will facilitate the company in improving its services base & quality. Mobilink by posting revenue of USD597 million (Jun.07) contributed 24 percent to both the group revenue & EBITDA. Ufone posted a revenue growth of more than 40 percent (in FY07), and was observed to contribute (in PTCL’s group revenue) around 20 percent in FY07 as compared to 14 percent in FY06.

Ufone, the second largest cellular operator in both subscribers’ term and the number of cell sites, enjoys the inherent advantage of having access to its parent company (PTCL) spread countrywide infrastructure backbone. In the wake of intensifying market competition, the company plans to roll out for further expansion. Such initiatives will not only expand its network capacity and coverage but will also enable the company to provide high-speed cellular mobile and wireless data services based on EDGE technology. On cost savings side, the infrastructure-sharing agreement (for 10yrs) signed between Ufone and Telenor is also expected to generate beneficial results going forward.

Telenor Pak has more than doubled its subscriber base to about 14mn over a year’s period (Nov. 2006-07). The growth was also accompanied by the operator’s rising market share from around 14 percent to 19 percent over the same period. The group’s 9MCY07 results showed Telenor Pak adding 4 percent to the total group revenue of around USD13bn. After the introduction of high-speed EDGE services by Telenor Pak, the company continues to go ahead With its expansion plans for further improving its quality & services.

Although competition continues to intensify, based on innovative product and services, and advanced technology, current average trend of offering value-added services (like IPTV, entertainment, etc.), and popularity of WiMax based solutions provide the operators with huge untapped potential to be explored in both rural & urban areas of the country.

@ The Bangladesh Journal