Idea Cellular: Lower IUC will turn all telcos, barring Jio, sick

Firm urges Trai to consider cost data to arrive at inter-connect usage charges

Warning that any move to lower the inter-connect usage charges (IUCs) would turn the entire telecom industry sick barring Reliance Jio, Aditya Birla Group-owned Idea Cellular on Thursday urged the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) to put industry call minutes into two buckets for a “correct” assessment of costs and then decide on the merits of reducing IUCs.

In a written communication to the telecom regulator, Idea Cellular’s managing director, Himanshu Kapania, said the Trai should bifurcate current industry minutes into those terminating on the voice over long-term evolution (VoLTE) networks used by Jio, and other networks like 2G/3G