Airtel’s move may have hurt mobile subscriber additions, but the impact of the reintroduced ₹299 plan on its Arpu might not be too negative sequentially in Q3, for several reasons. Q2’s Arpu improvement was mainly driven by factors such as an additional day in the quarter and a higher number of postpaid subscribers. Since the tariff tweak in prepaid plans was effective only for part of Q2, its impact on Arpu was limited. Also, Airtel has raised tariffs across all its postpaid plans by ₹50 per month from 8 October, with the minimum plan price increasing from ₹449 to ₹499. This should support Arpu even if postpaid mobile subscribers continue to account for a small share of its subscriber base, at 8.3% at the end of September.
