'Our strategy is to focus on quality of service'

What are the major issues faced by Pakistan's telecom industry?

Faced with over competition, all segments of the telecom market including fixed line, WLL, mobile phone, and broadband are facing financial difficulties. The ARPUs are the lowest in the world and still coming down. The costs are increasing mainly due to increased use of diesel fuel for gensets as a result of acute shortage of electricity, high inflation, and devaluation of currency. The market is almost saturated and the operators are struggling to maintain their shares. There is no customer loyalty particularly in the prepaid segment of the mobile market which constitutes the lion's share of the customer base of any operator, as switching to another operator's network is very easy because of free SIM availability and implementation of an efficient number portability system. The services offered by all the operators are very similar to each other, voice being prime. Under the circumstances, the only playground that remains is the price.

How do you think the telecom industry of Pakistan is likely to evolve in two-three years?

The fixed telecom sector of Pakistan was deregulated in 2003 with an open licensing regime for LL and long distance international traffic. This resulted in entrance of a very large number but relatively small operators in the market with limited capital base. The government awarded two more licenses in mobile sector bringing the total to six operators, which proved to be much more than the actual demand. The glut in the market has created a situation, where market consolidation is the need of the time and merger/acquisition is the talk of the town. It is therefore anticipated that number of mobile operators will reduce to three, LDIs to five, and LLs to less than 10.

What is your market strategy to increase your market share?

Pakistan Mobile Telecommunications Limited (Mobilink) covers over 90% of Pakistan's population and has about 31% of market share with the largest technical as well as sales network. Our strategy is to capitalize on its network size and focus on quality of service both in terms of service as well as customer care. A two-year total quality management plan named as 'No Samjota' (No compromise) has been launched to enable the system to provide best services to the customers.

What are the major regulatory issues being faced by the country?

There are not many regulatory issues in Pakistan. Interconnection regime is functioning very smoothly. However, the regulator is not geared up to face the challenges of IP and NGN interconnection.

What lies ahead for your company right now?

Meeting the challenges for next year.

Madhura K Mukherjee
madhuraK@cybermedia.co.in