Tata DOCOMO to invest Rs 1,400 cr in K'taka

Tata DOCOMO, Tata Teleservices telecom arm on the GSM platform, will be doubling its investment in Karnataka to around 1,400 crore by March 2010, a top official said.

"We will be doubling our investment in Karnataka from the $150 million invested so far (from July to October) to $300 million by March 2010 in view of the overwhelming response we've received for our services here," Yatish Mehrotra, south head, Tata Docomo told reporters here today.

"This additional investment of $150 mn in the next three months will be towards improving our insfrastructure and expanding our capacity and network," he said.

Tata DOCOMO has its network in 450 towns and 3,000 villages in Karnataka, Mehrotra said.

From July to October 2009, the telecom industry on the whole has added 3.58 million subscribers out which 1.96 million belong to Tata Teleservices, taking its market share in the industry to 55 per cent, he said.

"As on October end Tata Tele (CDMA & GSM) has 3.8 million subscribers in Karnataka," Mehrotra said.

"Our focus on transparency in pricing and relevant innovation has been our USP (unique selling proposition) making Tata Teleservices the number one operator in Karnataka and country with a subscriber base of about 4 million a month," he said.

Tata DOCOMO arose out Tata Group's strategic alliance with Japanese telecom major NTT Docomo in November 2008.