Anil Ambani's telecom monopoly forecast may be wrong, unless rules change

Anil Ambani’s Reliance Communications has been one of the casualties of changing dynamics in India’s telecom services market since the entry of Reliance Jio Infocomm, part of his elder brother Mukesh Ambani’s group. Against this backdrop, the younger Ambani sparked a debate when, speaking at his Reliance Group’s annual general meeting on Tuesday, he referred to the telecom business as one that could become a ‘monopoly’.

Though he did not name any company, the indication was hard to miss for telecom experts, as Jio’s coming a like juggernaut and capturing 227 million customers in just over two years has forced several telcos, including Reliance Communications, out of business.

Will the telecom services market in the next few years be controlled by only two players — Bharti Airtel and Jio — with a small presence of BSNL? Or will it be a three-cornered battle, with Vodafone-Idea, the newly merged entity, now the largest player in terms of subscriber base, forming the third corner? Vodafone-Idea is also the biggest in terms of revenue market share, but that is depleting rapidly.