Indian telecommunicat; i kis z thre largest in the Wedd eye With more than 550 million connections is Asia. The teleco; munlcate second largest among, the emerging economies fons emerged as one of the key sectors ‘Snomic growth during the last decade. Some ol as follows: Sector sae T accounts for 1 per cent of India’s GDP. Likely to double felecom services contribute 30 per Indian telecom sector Sives dir cent of India’s total service tax revenue. ect employment to more than 4,00,000 le 00,000 people in China, ao f software, B is ifeli aoe Reece ae and IT companies, but is also the lifelin State-of-the-art telecom infrast: : ructure has led to the rise of cities like Mysore Mangalore, Jaipur, Ahmedabad, Kochi on the software services map. This ha p ped spread the benefits of a booming Indian economy to beyond metros an arge cities, and, thus, wealth creation is happening in tier-2 cities also. JEF HISTORY unications started in 1851 when the first operational landlines were laid by th ment near Calcutta (the seat of British power). Telephone services on commerci were introduced in India in 1881. In 1883, telephone services were merged wil postal system. Indian Radio Telegraph Company (IRT) was formed in 1923. ; 5 is ign telecommunication companies we After independence in 1947, all the foreign alized = form the Posts, Telephone and Telegraph (PTT), a monopoly runt gove t’s Ministry of Communications. Telecom sector was considered as 5 rmiment a the government considered it best to bring under its control. tegic pou f reforms in the telecommunications sector began to flow in 1984 eS. allowed in. telecommunications equipment manufacturin When the private sector was ; Telecommunications (DOT) was established. Tt we 1985, the Department of © nd long-distance service that would be its ov ive provider piqdomets a system). In 1986, two wholly government-owne tor (separate from the Deh Zanchar Nigam Limited (VSNL) for internation ies were created: the Vides! ar Telephone Nigam Limited (MTNL) for servi nications and Mahanag: etropolitan areas.338 BUSINESS sTuDiEs-xI In 1990s, telecommunications sector benefited from the Cabal pet fconomy. Also, examples of telecom revolution in Shae policy-maker resulted in better quality of service and lower eae f telecom services se, initiate a change process finally resulting in opening up o for the private sector. NATIONAL TELECOM POLICY National Telecom Policy (NTP) 1994 was the first attempt to ee ee roadmap for the Indian telecommunications sector. In 1997, Tel ecom o ‘ab Authority of India (TRAI) was created to act as a regulator to facilitate the groy of the telecom sector. New National Telecom Policy was adopted in 1999 and celly Services were also launched in the same year. Telecommunication sector in India can be divided into two segments: (i) Fi, Line Services, and (i) Cellular Services. Fixed line services consist of basic servic national or domestic long distance and international long distance call services. 1 - However, privi » high-end servic s, international long distance calls, and handset pr; i ae ates Prices has driven demand of bot owSystem for Mobile Communication sector in India mainly comprises of the mpanies FIGURE 4: Major GSM Companie: iT E340 Business sTUDIES-x! CDMA SECTOR F C ises of companies ‘Code Division Multiple Access sector in India mainly compri: shown in Fig. 2. VIRGIN MOBILE FIGURE 2: Major CDMA Companies IPTV SECTOR Internet Protocol Television Sector of India mainly comprises of the companies shown in Fig. 3. BHARTI AIRTEL _ FIGURE 3 Major IPTV Campanies UeChapter 3 AND METHODOLOGY sent project is intended to ox J : xplore the f ious fgevice providers. It F customers’ preferences t : evil has been ‘undertaken lepine in iaisd te onecieg obtain an overyj e Be identify th. eview OF the Indian telecommumicati @ To ify the cellular service munications sector. technology used by them, amely, GSM COAL ee ten maison To collect primary data fro, m resent the data for drawing Lccea i 100 respondents and to analyse and (® To list findings and conclusions of the project. To make suitable suggestions for th : 3 idiretain customers ie telecommunication companies to attract RCH METHODOLOGY of Data dy undertaken is mainly based on the primary data collected from a sample peervice users with the help of a structured questionnaire. Secondary data, ta from authenticated websites, journals and other sources has also been used purpose of this project. ;odology er to collect primary data for this project, a questionnaire has been designed. ins fourteen questions directed at collecting data about people's preferences 5 various mobile service providers. ple size is 100 respondents who were picked up at random. The sample i small because of time constraints. No distinction among the respondents wat le on the basis of sex, age, educa he sample. tion, employment, etc. because of the small size snts of class X and above and 30 respondent ics 4 ad SE ea aire two CAs and one doctor. Th ess persons an He ersonally and explained the purpose of this proje Se a to fll he questionnaire. It was ensured to obtain respons they were asked to fill in the 4 on ts en a Ie questions in the questionnaire gful conculsions. data so collected Bar diagrams have been Beers of various service P’ m the se S in the objectives of th d analysed to attain of th ee presentation of data for meaningf different criteria. was tabu use roviders OnChapter 4 ON LYSIS AND PRESENTAT! DATA A ces, NeW innovatic, 4 by personal preferent ns, The customers have always been influe! ¥ y f the time. The underlying i uaren ere ith the help effet of demonstration RAR Rae of data collected wii help ¢, chapter is focu: on an. respondents. questionnaire from different a sample of 100 resp f tion? Response to 0.1—Do you have any mobile connect Inference; The data above clearly show that all the Bere econ has been conducted have their mobile connections. Thus, ah a all the respondents are relevant for the purpose of the present project. i ? Response to Q.2—How many mobile connections do you have? ea i 55% 2 35% <| 6% Miore than 3 4% Inference: The data above show that there are 55% people who have only or nnection and 35% are having two connections. Ther pn The above data clearly show that there are only 5% Paid service in co; i i ale parison with 95% of the total people su: People who pret rveyed who preferre 'Inference: The Bar chart clearly shows the domination of Vodafone, Airte ance among the respondents selected randomly. However, this trend doe ent the actual state of affairs in the telecom industry. The telecoms like # Indicom and Idea are still in the progressive stage in comparison with the companies. Vodafone is leading with 44% and Airtel is second rankec with 20%, where as Reliance is in the third position with 13%. And th panies like MTNL is 4%, Aircel is 7%,Tata Indicom is 3%, Idea is 8% ar er companies are with 1%, onse to Q. 5—Up to what extent are you satisfied with network service ¢ Tnference: About the satisfaction : vider Be customers 1 satisfied 20 bes: % are hig e provider and 25' evel of the customers with their satisfied with their network servic % of the customers are neut344 BUSINESS STUDIES-XI 5% of the respondents are not is jut the network service of their service providers. Bi eae atisfied and are planning to change their service P! es Response to Q.6—Which facility attracts you the foe i He : 45% of the customers are is clear that a rates. 30% of the customers Inference: From the above table it and 5% of the respondents are attracted towards a service provider because of the low surveyed are attracted by the coverage facility. 15%,5% ae attracted by GPRS, Roaming and others facilities respectively. Response to Q.7— Rank the following factors which influenced you to biry the service of your choice? Factors Ej Els Se En ZZ Me | P2538 sae 5 EMA ae Network" Brand image aS: fa — em pom poor ik it is clear that 45%, 15%, 30% and 10% of the a : on ne Order respectively. In the case of » 47%, and 5% of the customers influenced in theet or | a is 25%, 55%, 15% and 5% which influenced Vely. In case of Value Added Services 30%, nflue ii ing, ord tively. can clearly say that wenced in decreasing order Tespectively. Customers are influenced maximum by the price and ind not much by the network and brand image. to O.8—How frequen thy T Tespecti Mrs are jy id you change your mobile service provider? is clear that there are 65% of the Saran dents who never changed their service providers, where as nee 5 rie Seah their service provider within a year, after one year and a! Seales me ly. It is obvious that a vast Majority of cell phone users rem: y from where they got their connection for the first time. ost to buy or e to 0.9—Rank the following VAS which attracted you the m we with the mobile service?ack, and 346 Business sTUDIES-XI that low call rates, pee oe From the above chart, we ean $34 00 buy Eee ISW call rates, Inference: From : on the cu ice whe! i fae eee ee ieee. ie pene a the people surveyed. Suse Fal talk time were on the higher P= Ri more impact on your buying fe i er nse to. 0.10—Rank which advertisement media pul espol 10 — decision? Inference: While subscribing to a mobile service, people are influenced by ertisements in TV, magazines, internet and newspaper, 67% of the respondents first rank to TV and 30% gave first rank to newspapers. It is interesting to note 35% of the respondents who were perhaps less educated Save fourth rank to paper ads while selecting the cell phone. onse to Q.11 How much is your month ise on mobile phones?APPENDIX-1; PROJECT REPORT 3.47 _ Inference: About the ag * Monthly ex; said that there monthly e es Uae Dey eure OE i Re 7 ¢ people le said that they s) pend people who say that i ponse to O.12—For how i ton; roi aa i ice provider? re you availing the services of this particular xe ae ‘between 7150 and #350, 20% of the penaeern m their mobile phone. There are 18% and 90 to £500 and above 500 respectively. r than 3 years 20% Inference: 30% of th their service provider oer euneyed ld SeS 45% and 20% people said eae and 35% said that they are availing for 2 Yoo ee espectively at they are availing services for 3 years and more thar onse to Q.13— i oe e to Q.13—Would you like to change your current service provider i ee 75 Be Inference: 75% provider and so they the people are willing Response to Q.14—If you want t service provider would you prefer? of the total people surveyed are satisfied with their serv do not want to change their service provider, whereas 25% to change their service provider in future. io change your service provider in future, w48 BUSINESS STUDIES-XI rence: From the above pie chart, we can clearly say that people are attracted Vodafone, Airtel and Reliance with 25%, 30% and 15% respectively, Other es like MTNL, Aircel, Tata Indicom, Idea and others are with 5%, 9%, 7%, % respectively. Therefore, we can say that Vodafone is likely to be the choice f the respondents in case they decide to change their service provider. aSChapter 5 NCLUSIONS con the data obtained fro drawn eae ents, the following conclusion: di + coul (i) Vodafone appears to be t occupies the aoe P preference of customers whereas airtel second 4 respon Frankin = pondents revealed that mayen the third. Interactions with the of them preferred Vodafi the fone because of their more attractive .. plans in ii) Respon See 4 (ii) ec hed: Abra Soe with those of other service providers, ork facilities. Some of ee a ae providers because of pondents. narrated their personal experience of talki E ing to frie i i the Airtel pease ends and relatives in remote rural areas through (iii) Reliance network is preferred competing in the market b me by cost conscious people. Reliance is Peetacnne discern: eae low call rates and low SMS rates. It was pack at a very nominal rate ee . aa that Reliance is offering SMS iv) The prefere pare (iv) a ee a a of ce cell phone users are not constant Because of changes quirements, or because of better services by some other service provider, they may shift loyalty from one service provider to another. SUGGESTIONS Findings of this study about customers’ prefere widers clearly indicate w future. The following sugge roviders in designing their marketing strategie: win new customers and also retain them: it ig time for Indian telecot 4, Competition in telecom industry is heating UP? mulate strategies tO attract new customers and retain the o! g, to the needs t rt Cee . ch the products accordin, ind loyal as very soon. the bl nces towards various mobile service ‘hat the customers expect from the service providers in idelines for the mobile service stions would serve as gui 5 to satisfy their customers better ones. They should think to ae ee rs to satis them and make em bral ; eno! Indian ee scenario will convert into ocean where the loss in of another. ract and retain customers WO one wou! > Quality of see and the. Pee mine success OF failure of the future In today’s competitive environmen id be the £4 E id the ability to att t : H communication service provider , customers are quick te aban ————350 BUSINESS STUDIES-XI Jr expectations. ‘The ease ee t their ex , nother, Services providers that do not pistes service provider ‘Gaervics quailty a customers can switch ae hie highest possible levels 9} that service providers deliver the 7 é Pre is erformance. on bases like type iis ihe providers should segment custome™ tr design pricing policies "required, quality of service, and cost See years , to meet the requirements of each segm| ing of their ‘customer realations 4. The service providers should improve the WorMINB TT, know about their " cells’ so as be in constant touch with the customers #0 Hoty 0000 | ME 2 se changing requirements and expectations. aes ‘ A ers. designing new service offerings for the custom: fee eoninr of a emul The above suggestions are based on the study he ae Penciniieve while ample of 100 respondents only. This Lee pees iev oc this nature nplementing the above suggestions. It is sugges! hers to get a deep insight into would be undertaken by the students and Tesearcl eae istomers’ preferences towards various mobile service providers. BIBLIOGRAPHY Ee ety WRB ae eee eR ernet Websites Referred w.indiatogether.com «business standard.com v.g00gle.com v-scribd.com azines and Newspapers Referred Today, New Delhi mic Times, New Delhi of India, New Delhi stan Times, New Delhi