Videocon Mobile to invest Rs 800 cr in Gujarat for FY '14

Even as it expands its cell site network and opens dedicated stores, Videocon Mobile Services is set to invest around Rs  800 crore for the fiscal 2013-14 in Gujarat circle.

The telecom operator has seen the second highest net subscriber addition in Gujarat for the months of May and June 2013.

What's more, of the Rs  800 crore investment laid out for Gujarat, Videocon Mobile has already invested around 40-50 per cent, said Arvind Bali, director and chief executive officer, Videocon Mobile Services.

"The investment has been made for expanding our cell site network as well as other activities. From an initial coverage footprint of 2805 cell sites in Gujarat, we have recently added 1291 new sites, taking the total coverage in Gujarat to 4096 cell sites," said Bali.  

However, the company is planning to further expand its coverage by adding 500-550 new cell sites till March 2014. "By next financial year, 1000-1500 more cell sites will be added in Gujarat," Bali added.

Apart from cell sites, the company is also looking to enhance its presence in the state through dedicated Videocon Connect stores. While the telecom operator already has around 42 such stores in Gujarat, it plans to take the total number of stores to 200 by March 2014.

"Gujarat is a very important market for Videocon Mobile Services. Our aim is to become the most preferred and admired telecom service provider in the state. We have just made a comeback into the telecom domain and within 6 months of comeback, we have got an overwhelming response from customers. The testimony being Videocon mobile services adding new subscribers since past two consecutive months," said Bali. While in the month of May Videocon added 37346 net users in Gujarat, in June 2013 the same was 41573 new net users.

According to Bali, much of the new customer acquisition is happening through mobile number portability (MNP) as well as because of mobile users getting attracted to the company's strong GPRS offering. "We have a strong GPRS connectivity and we have been ensuring that users get added because of our data and GPRS connectivity. About 42-46 per cent of our new customer acquisition is happening because of GPRS and 20-25 per cent customer acquisition happens through MNP," he added.

Meanwhile, Videocon Mobile Services plans to add another 250,000-300,000 new users by September 2013 to its current close to 800,000 subscriber base.