The VSAT (Very Small Aperture Terminal) sector in India grew at a rate of 5.08 percent for the quarter ended September 2008 as compared to the previous quarter. The country’s VSAT service providers were collectively able to take the subscriber base to 94,436 as compared to 89,868 in Jun’ 08  quarter.

Leading the race is Hughes Communications with a subscriber base of 29,670 at the end of Sep’08 as compared to 27,065 in June’08. This reflects into a growth rate of 9.62 percent. Market share of the company stood at 31.42 percent.

HCL Comnet and Bharti Airtel are competing neck and neck with the former having subscriber base of 24,885 as compared to Bharti Airtel’s 23,989. While HCL managed a quarterly growth rate of 1.86 percent, Bharti Airtel performed better with growth rate at 3.84 percent.

Source: TRAI

The top 3 service providers namely Hughes Communications, HCL Comnet and Bharti Airtel collectively account for 83.27 percent of the VSAT market in India.

Other players in the field include Bharti Broadband, Essel Shyam, Tatanet Services, ITI and BSNL.

Source: TRAI

Source: TRAI