Reliance, is offering the cheapest mobile data network and the mobile tariffs for the smartphone users in the world. At least this is what it claims to do. With the arrival of Reliance Jio, The arrival of Jio, it has started a fierce battle among Indian telecoms firms to win customers. The other telecom companies couldn’t simply sit and wait for Jio to take over them. With the launch of Reliance Jio, the tariff war is officially on. With telecom companies like Airtel, Vodafone, Idea and BSNL, trying their best to come up with plans and offers which can help them get their customers back. This Sunday we saw two telecom giants Vodafone and BSNL forming a partnership on a 2G intra-circle roaming agreement (ICR).
India’s largest phone operator Bharti Airtel has now agreed to provide additional points of interconnection to the new 4G entrant Reliance Jio. Airtel will offer point of interconnects or PoI to Reliance Jio which will help the newest 4G operator in serving its customers who are facing massive call drops ever since its launch.
Jio had said in a statement that the Jio customers faced over 220 million call failures on Airtel’s network. The Jio consumers faced over 520 million calls failures cumulatively on the networks of the three incumbent operators (Airtel, Vodafone and Idea). Jio has been writing letters to the TRAI, discussing the matter of how the incumbent operators were not releasing interconnect bandwidth.
However on Monday Idea Cellular had offered Reliance Jio additional PoIs to Jio. These PoI will serve around 6.5 million customers. Bharti Airtel would give Jio PoI which is three times the current level. These PoI can serve over 15 million customers and is significantly higher than Jio’s existing 5 million customer base.
In a big breakthrough in the ongoing telecom tussle, Bharti Airtel has agreed to provide additional PoIs (Points of Interconnect) to Reliance Jio. Airtel has said that it is committed to complying with the regulations and interconnect agreements. It has however expressed hope that the TRAI will look into the issue of asymmetric traffic urgently. Bharti Airtel’s move will come as a big boost to Reliance Jio, which has been alleging that major telecom players are not providing PoIs to it.
Commenting on Airtel’s decision, Rajan Mathews of COAI (Cellular Operators Association of India) has said, “Any step which improves services for customers is a welcome one. I believe that post the meeting between TRAI and operators, the POI issue is being addressed.” “Operators want the issue of asymmetric traffic to be addressed on urgent basis,” he added.
Last week TRAI had called a meeting of Reliance Jio and the major incumbent telecom players such as Bharti Airtel, Idea and Vodafone. Hitting out at Reliance Jio on interconnect issue, Bharti Airtel had asked TRAI to find a way to curb the “massive asymmetric traffic” and ensure that receiving networks are not “abused by tsunami of free traffic”. The company had said it was “grateful” to Trai for enabling a constructive dialogue today on the matter of providing PoIs to Reliance Jio.
Reliance Jio had accused GSM operators of denying interconnection to its customers. “It’s a fight for customers, justice and not for any particular operator. We have raised the issue of interconnect points with TRAI,” Reliance Jio said after the meeting. The incumbent operators, under the aegis of COAI, have locked horns with the new entrant Reliance Jio – which has charted an aggressive tariff and roll out strategy for 4G services – over points of interconnect or connectivity within various networks.
Days after telecom regulator Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) brokered truce between warring telcos, Bharti Airtel released additional interconnect bandwidth to Reliance Jio, taking the tally up to 2,000 points of interconnect (PoIs). Both Idea and Airtel red-flagged the issue of traffic asymmetry, while announcing release of fresh PoIs to Jio.
Within hours of Airtel’s statement, Jio backed it with its own statement, which said consumers of Jio faced over 220 million call failures on Airtel’s network, while 520 million calls failed cumulatively on the networks of the three incumbent operators. Jio has been writing letters to the regulator, as incumbent operators were not releasing interconnect bandwidth - they objected to its enlarged trial programme. Even after Jio announced the commercial launch of its service, incumbents did not release PoIs. At the meeting called by Trai, incumbent operators agreed to release more interconnects to Jio.
On Monday, Idea released 196 additional PoIs to Jio, while Bharti Airtel’s total tally of PoIs to Jio went up to 2,000. With the latest augmentation, the total number of PoIs will become three times the present number. In a statement,Airtel said: “Based on the current traffic pattern with all other operators, this capacity is sufficient to serve over 15 million customers, which is significantly higher than Jio’s existing customer base.”
India’s largest telecommunications services provider on Tuesday said following its bilateral discussions with Jio, it will provide additional PoIs to it. Airtel had extended an invitation to Jio to discuss its requirement of additional PoI.
While releasing additional interconnect-bandwidth to Jio, both Idea and Airtel maintained the asymmetry in traffic volumes would be an issue and hoped the regulator would look into it. Telecom operators had expressed concern before the regulator on September 9 that since Jio was offering free voice, the traffic emanating from its network was far higher than that originating from their networks and terminating on Jio’s network.
Idea, on Monday, said Trai had been informed in August there existed an unprecedented asymmetry of traffic of 14.5 times between Idea and Jio. The company’s statement said: “Never ever has such a high asymmetry been observed with a new operator in the past. The company is also incurring higher costs due to this high level of traffic asymmetry.” Telcos have also argued that the asymmetry would impact the experience of their subscribers.
Jio, in response, said the outgoing traffic from its network was less than two calls per customer per hour, even during peak traffic period, which requires only a reasonable number of PoIs. The company’s statement said: “These calls are not to one operator but distributed over all the operators. Incumbent operators are describing such a modest call rate as a tsunami of traffic fromReliance Jio Infocomm (RJIL).”
Jio further called the apprehension expressed by incumbents regarding asymmetric voice traffic as “unsubstantiated.” RJIL wishes to clarify that the voice traffic on its network is in line with industry trends and as expected for any new operator. Over time, as the customer base grows, this asymmetry reduces and the traffic becomes symmetric.
Clearly, the last word has not been said on this matter.
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