What do you think is the future of new operator companies in telecom industry?

Good analysis by Aviral..

I think the biggest entry barrier for new players in this telecom businiess (with their own Nw) is the huge initial investment which is needed and for old players the biggest challenge is the entry of some substitue product or can say some change in technology,for example operator who have done a huge investment in SS7 Nw don't want to go for an all IP Nw.

Keeping in point that there is lot of untapped market in India definitely there will be a good number of new entrants but I don't think anybody is willing to go from the scratch.

M&A/Alliances by sure will be the only alternative in present scenario but I somehow also feels that if the thing continues like the same way,this kind of margins presure if continue then in the long run there will be only few winners or can say only few operators are going to sustain in this market.

Telecom industry is still in its beginning stage in rural areas and as more than 70% of India's population stays in rural sector, it is a very good opportunity for new operators to get their market share. As Ms. Sundaram said, new operators doing alliance with other companies will be most effective way of becoming success un urban areas. Not only this will be cheaper, but also time efficient.

Opportunity is always there... even in saturated urban markets. The key is the differentiation and wave that the product-offerings are able to create. Rise of Aircel as a visible consumer telecom name is an example about how they are able to create a position by intensive investment on developing the brand. The key however lies in the value that the customer perceives in subscribing to an operator. This is the most difficult part to do. 

Alliances can happen in terms of sharing infrastructure (e.g. IRU kinds) or it can happen in terms of sharing traffic. Brand cannot be shared becasue it will create confusion in the consumer's mind. From my perspective, the new operators can be of two types. One who invest in the infrastructure heaviliy and others who invest in the innovative offerings (VNOs). Traditionally, operators who have invested heavily on infrastructure are unable to offer the kind of innovation that VNOs promise. 

The success of operators who choose the infrastructure path depends on how well they are able to handle the complexities of their physical network and allow the VNOs to latch on/off their network easily and realiably. Their success will lie in the reliablity, stability, and predictibility they are able to display. They will need to have the carrier perspective rather than the consumer perspective.

On the other hand, the VNOs will have to be nimble and agile. They will have to be ultra-innovative with their sensors on the consumer pulse. They will have very dynamic product groups which will know how to cash in on fads and trends to create traffic. Behind these product managers will be a set of people who will know how to stitch in the various traffic carriers effectively and economically. 

Communication is a new-age commodity now but very different from the traditional ones. It is magical in its capability to offer new mechanisms to  deliver value to the end customes. For example, video survellience is an emerging market right now which will contriubte significantly to the demand for data networks. The need for data networks is still in the growth phase. Humans I believe are capable of communicating far more than what they are doing right now. 

As long as I keep hearing the news about servers crashing due to high-levels of user activities, I see a great futue for any new telecom operator.

In India there is a great opportunity as still there is a huge market that is untapped and from now on whoever the new operator comes will go for alliance and this will be seen more in future and in a recent survey where many top company executives were interviewed they all came to one conclusion that alliances were consistently rated the most effective way to get the strategic advantages those executives wanted for their companies in a number of key activities, including speed to market and access to expertise.