Telenor Celebrates 6th Anniversary In India, Completes Modernization Of 2500 Sites

As part of its network transformation project, the company is on track to complete live network swap of 5000 sites with state-of-the-art equipment by year end to deliver high speed Internet

Telenor India today completed six years of successful operations in the country. Being the youngest it also is fast to modernize its existing network in preparation to launch high speed internet services in the coming years. The company announced the completion of modernizing 2500 sites across six circles. These sites have now got the latest equipment to deliver better voice and Internet services to Telenor customers.

Speaking on the anniversary and completion of network swap, Sharad Mehrotra, CEO Telenor India Communications, said, “This is a momentous day for us. We have not only completed six years of delivering Sabse Sasta and value for money products to our customers but also achieved a milestone in our journey towards becoming a digital services provider. The network modernization project will help us prepare to address the demand for high speed data as mobile internet will be the primary mode for consumers as services continue to get digital.”

Earlier this year, Telenor announced a program to swap its entire network of 24000 base stations with state-of-the-art equipment by 2017. This is the largest network project of its kind when legacy equipments are being replaced on a live network without any service disruption. In the first phase of the project, 5000 sites are to be modernised by end of 2015. In addition to this, Telenor is also expanding its network in Bihar and Jharkhand by adding 950 sites.

“The network modernisation programme shows our long term commitment to the India market. In a spectrum constrained and highly competitive business environment, the efficiencies we derive from the new network will help us maintain a cost efficient operation and be future ready to manage the increasing demand from our customers for data services,” said Sharad.

Telenor’s new network is being executed and managed by Huawei India. The new equipments will increase spectral efficiency by 15% and improve in-door coverage by 15-20%, and also reduce power consumption by around 30%.

Telenor had launched its mobile services in 2009 as Uninor and currently operates in six telecom circles of India. In September this year it acquired the global brand identity and changed its name to Telenor India. For the last six years, Telenor has built a market position of being most affordable and promises to offer additional value for all customers. To ensure superior value to the mass market customer, it announced an industry first initiative of free insurance cover and entertainment services packs starting as low as Rs 2 for unlimited music & videos downloads for a day. For the next three months, Telenor is also offering one month of free video access to new customers joining its network.

Telenor Group has an ambition of providing “Internet For All” and aims to have 200 million customers accessing data services on its network globally. In India, the company has taken a target of having 50% of its users to access Internet by 2017. Currently, the company has 48.72 million subscribers and over 22% of them are data users. The retail network of Telenor India has 2100 branded stores and over 380,000 points of sale.

In revenue market share and customer market share, Telenor India is number 4 in its six operational circles.