The Winning Lap

06 Jun 2009 12:32 IST

New Update

It was a landmark year for Ericsson when the company's revenue crossed the Rs
10,000 crore mark in the Indian market, recording a growth of 28.9%. Though
Ericsson managed a strong growth rate despite the recession, it was nowhere
close to the impressive 60% it managed in FY 2007-08.

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The highlight of the year gone by was the company helping BSNL in achieving
India's biggest simultaneous launch of 3G services in eleven leading cities.
Apart from that Ericsson also implemented the Mumbai GSM Idea deal in the last
fiscal. And got its first contract for delivery of its hosted consumer push
email service to Aircel.

The company continued its strong relationship with Bharti and is doing some
expansion deals with them. However, recently, Bharti formed a $500 mn managed
services JV with Alcatel-Lucent and not with Ericsson. Currently Ericsson
manages around 60 mn customers in the Bharti network.

In keeping with its commitment to come out with environment-friendly
products, Ericsson launched Tower Tube, which, according to the company, will
cost 40% lesser than the cost of the traditional towers. According to industry
sources, the company is also working on new projects to utilize solar cell power
to help operators to expand their networks in rural and remote areas.

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Ericsson

The company has started the second phase of Gramjyoti, wherein it signed an
MoU with the Apollo Telemedicine Networking Foundation (ATNF) to share expertise
and take up specific projects to drive telemedicine practice across the country.
Currently, Ericsson is conducting pilots in this regard.

There was also a change in the top management of the company with the country
head, Mats Granyard, replaced by Gowton Achaibar as president of Ericsson's
India and Sri Lanka operations.

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President,
Ericsson, India and Sri Lanka

Gowton Achaibar

Address: Ericsson Forum, DLF Cybercity,
Sector-25A, Gurgaon-122002,

Haryana, India

Ph: +91-124-2560808

Fax: +91-124-2565454

Website:www.ericsson.com/in

Highlights

Rolled out 100,000 RBS
Helped BSNL in achieving the largest
multi-city launch of 3G services in India
Expanded into infrastructure areas such as
providing leading airports with in-building solutions for GSM coverage as
well as real estate
Planning to focus on 2G till subscriber
base reaches 700-800 mn

On the multimedia front, Ericsson complemented its market position with the
acquisition of LHS to ensure a solution for converged billing requirement.
Ericsson also acquired Tandberg Television to offer solutions in the video
compressed technologies.

Though the company is equipped for the launch of 3G in India, it plans to
focus more on 2G. Since the market is currently at 400 mn and is growing to over
700 mn, massive deployment of 2G infrastructure is likely to continue for a
while.

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We will maintain our focus on 2G networks

You
continued to gain marketshare despite the economic situation. What were your
achievements in the last financial year?

The year has been quite extraordinary for us despite the chaotic
economic situation. We consolidated our leadership position in India, and
became one of the largest markets for Ericsson worldwide, equivalent to
China and USA.

Apart from new contracts, we also extended our current relationships,
receiving expansion orders from all of our customers including Bharti, BSNL,
Idea, MTNL, Aircel and Vodafone. On the manufacturing side, we celebrated a
significant milestone when we rolled out our 100,000 RBS.

One of the most noteworthy moments was helping BSNL achieve the largest
multi-city launch of 3G services in India.

Other highlights included the launch of the Ericsson Tower Tube in India,
growth of our broader portfolio of solutions (Redback and Tandberg products)
as well as our expansion into infrastructure areas such as providing leading
airports with our in-building solutions for GSM coverage as well as real
estate, where we deployed wireline broadband solutions using GPON
technology.

India is one of the fastest growing telecom markets in the world. What
are your plans to garner maximum share in this market?

We will maintain our focus on 2G networks, which we expect will continue
to grow until the subscriber base reaches 700-800 mn. We will continue to
expand our 3G business with BSNL across various dimensions including
networks, business consulting and marketing, and prepare ourselves for the
3G auctions expected later this year.

What are the challenges you are facing in the Indian market?

We have to find solutions for many of the challenges faced by our
customers; the need to find ways to reduce power consumption in our
equipment, implement tools and methods to optimize the use of frequency,
lower the cost of operations, expand the capacity of the transmission
networks, etc. We also face aggressive competition from several major
players given the rapid growth of the Indian market and the attractiveness
that this presents due to its size and scale. In addition, given the many
players in the Indian telecom market and the shortage of competent technical
resources, employee retention continues to be a major challenge.

Which are the growth drivers?

The major growth driver continues to be the need for basic
communications or voice and SMS services. With the market at 400 mn and
growing to over 700 mn, massive deployment of 2G infrastructure will
continue for a while. This will be followed by the deployment of 3G networks
that will enable a new set of VAS. Today VAS services account for less than
10% of operator's revenues and are anticipated to become greater than 25% as
in more developed markets.

In a first of its kind project, Ericsson is all set to build a
Fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) technology based communications infrastructure for
property management services provider, Radius Synergies.

Ericsson's long term focus is to enable broadband on any device and anywhere.
The introduction of 3G/HSPA will drive mobile broadband services into India.
With HSPA embedded chips being readily available in many devices, there will be
a major uptake in wireless broadband in urban and suburban markets -and Ericsson
will be a key player.

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Ericsson is likely to record a higher growth rate in the current year based
on the deals with new operators, where its arch rival NSN is conspicuous by its
absence. The company is set to bag a deal for an all India rollout from Swan as
well as Telenor. Since the new operators are likely to buy the state-of-the-art
equipment, the size of the order is also likely to be bigger than the ones with
the existing players.