Bharti Airtel has slashed 4G data charges by 31 percent to expand its fourth-generation wireless broadband services in the country. The company’s 4G services are currently available in Bangalore, Kolkata, Pune and Chandigarh.

But the Industry experts who have estimated Aitel’s 4G subscribers in these cities below 20,000 since it started rolling out the high speed service in April 2012 are skeptical about the move being a game changer for the company as far as the boosting the data usage is concerned.

“Starting from monthly rent of Rs 450, these new Airtel 4G plans will encourage more and more customers to enjoy superfast 4G speeds, now delivered at even greater value”, Airtel said in a statement.

While the Rs.450, Rs.650 and Rs.750 Airtel 4G plans offer data quota (GBs) at rents similar to 3G plans at superfast 4G speeds, the plans starting Rs.999 offer accelerated data benefits at rate of Rs.100/GB.

Customers subscribing to Rs.999 and above plans will also be able to enjoy free access to an entertainment library of 1,000 movies and 100 games powered by BigFlix and indiagames.

Airtel offers 2 kinds of 4G devices for customers to choose from. The Airtel 4G dongle brings high-speed wireless internet experience to the laptop, while the Airtel 4G CPE Router offers a home WiFi solution wherein multiple devices , including 3G smartphones and  3G tablets, can access internet at  4G speed.

Bharti Airtel, in May 2012 had appointed Chinese Information and Communications Technology (ICT) solutions giant Huawei, to plan, design, supply and deploy its TD LTE (4G) network in Karnataka.
 
Before that Airtel had rolled out 4G services in Kokata with another Chinese telco major ZTE.
 
In 2010, Airtel had successfully bid for BWA license spectrum in Kolkata, Karnataka, Punjab and Maharashtra (excluding Mumbai) circles. Additionally, earlier this year, Bharti Airtel acquired 49 percent interest in Qualcomm AP’s India entities that hold BWA licenses in Delhi, Mumbai, Haryana and Kerala.

Few days back Bharti Airtel lowered its 2G data usage charges by 90% in Punjab and Haryana. Airtel said it wants to make internet usage affordable for its subscribers. Yet the fact is that operators are now fighting the new battle for internet penetration though mobile in rural and semi-urban regions of the countries.
 
Mohammad Chowdhury, leader telecom, PwC India said, "Recent tariff reductions for data are aimed at stretching usage, since they kick in once a user has exhausted their pre-paid data limit. So rather than "price war" we would see this as a further step to build usage in data.
 
“There is a potential concern that reductions in 2G data prices again increases the price differential to 3G, making 3G look less attractive - but we think this will be marginal and the greater impact here will be on encouraging more data usage all around", he said.

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