Telecom density at 100 percent: NTA

KATHMANDU, June 18:

Country's telephone density has increased to 99.8 percent, according to the latest Management Information System (MIS) of Nepal Telecommunications Authority (NTA).

But it cannot be said that telephone access has reached all the population as the figures is based on number of telephone subscriptions, according to NTA officials. "The data should not be misunderstood. It does not mean that all the people in the country has access to telephone. As the telephone penetration is based on the number of subscribers, we can say that the number of telephone subscriptions is now equal to country's population," Ananda Raj Khanal, director of NTA, said. "We are planning to ask Visitor Location Register (VLR) report from the operation so that actual number of subscribers can be published in the MIS report."

VLR report will help NTA to know the actual number of active mobile phone users.

Buddhi Prasad Acharya, managing director of Nepal Telecom (NT), accepted that the number of subscribers is system generated and not based on active users. "We deactivate the SIM only if the users do not use it regularly for three month," added Acharya.

According to the report, NT has the highest number of subscribers (12.18 million) followed by Ncell with 12.15 million subscribers. In the same period last year, Ncell had 11.16 million subscribers followed by NT with 10.24 million subscribers.

However, Ncell's share in GSM segment is still higher than NT. Ncell has 54.5 percent share in the GSM segment, according to the MIS report.

"When compared to same service, that is GSM service, we are still the market leader," Milan Sharma, corporate communications expert of Ncell, told Republica.

As at mid-March, Ncell had 12.15 GSM users compared to NT's 10.18 million.

Ncell provides only GSM service, while NT provides fixed line, GSM and CDMA services.

In terms of market share for data, NT leads with 57.31 percent market share followed by Ncell (40.23 percent).

According to the report, total internet penetration has reached 40.23 percent of the total population.

In recent months, both Ncell and NT have been focusing on data services and expanding their 3G coverage.

"Now that the convergent billing system has come into implementation, we are planning to bring special packages for data service. We are also expanding our 3G coverage," added Acharya.

According to NTA, there are three basic telecommunications service providers, two GSM cellular service providers, 10 network service providers, 33 VSAT users, 43 Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and 83 limited mobility service providers.

Source: Republica