The Way Ahead

The way ahead .... Silde number one : As on Dec 08, the rural teledensity is 12.59 and urban teledensity is 81.38 (TRAI press release )

Strategy for urban market 1.The urban market is highly competitive and Airtel has been able to capture a significant share of the market.(It is a star to cash cow border line case right now) 2.The way ahead is to stretch the product line upwards and push the augmented and future products to existing customers in the urban markets. 4.The introduction should be a rapid skimming one as these are cutting edge technologies for the Indian market. 3.This should move the urban customer into a cash cow position than it is currently in. Slide number two Strategy for rural India 1. To utlize the opportunites in rural India ( TRAIhas set a target of adding 100 million rural subscriber to the telecom sector), Airtel should stretch its a product line downwards . 2.Airtelcan tap into this vast rural populace by leveraging their pan India presence , strong distribution channel and strong brand equity. By providing basic cellular services at competitive prices . 3.Thisintroduction should be a Rapid Penetration Strategy of low price and high promotion to get a foothold in the market. The idea is to become a Star in the rural market first and derive economy of scale first. 4.Once that is achieved , then value added services can be pushed to convert the position to a cash cow.

(I have attached one excel in the mail which has the market share of airtel as on april 2009 w.r.t to other operators, we may build a BCG model of the whole subscriber base and say that it is safe to approximate this relationship for the prepaid [roduct as well , it should be fine)