Bharti Airtel’s Vittal warns regulation is falling behind rapid tech changes

Bharti Airtel

Managing Director Gopal Vittal on Tuesday warned that regulation is struggling to keep pace with rapid technological changes, as the telecom sector faces increasing pressure from the broader digital ecosystem.

Speaking at the India Mobile Congress, Vittal said regulators are focusing heavily on telecom, which is only a small part of the challenges in trust and security across the digital world.

“I think regulation needs to keep pace with changes in technology. And I feel regulation is not keeping pace with changes in technology because most regulators today globally, it's not just in India, are focused on the telecom sector, which is a very small part of the surface area of the problems that are being created in trust and security,” he said.

Vittal highlighted that while telecom regulation is strict, the larger digital ecosystem remains largely unregulated. “It's like, you have a small part of a ground where there's a lot of action going on, but there's a very large field which is a Wild West. And I think all of these areas need to be addressed,” he added.

The Airtel chief also touched upon the challenges of operating in India’s telecom market, pointing to low average revenue per user (ARPU) and the demanding nature of Indian customers. “India is a very, very difficult place to operate in because the customer is more demanding than the customers in Europe. Just in terms of the quality of the network, you're operating with the lowest ARPUs and the lowest rate per gigabyte and yet you have to make money,” Vittal said.

He indicated that there is scope for pricing adjustments and urged telecom players to explore efficiency improvements and new revenue streams. “There is headroom for pricing to go up in India. But that said, I think you just have to be more and more efficient in how you deliver the service and at the same time start looking at alternate revenue streams and new revenue streams,” he said.