Indian veterans comes out very strongly with free Internet India and also support OTT player including messaging applications. These messaging apps are ultimately uses mobile operator network to acquire their user base but hurt mobile operators the most. Many operator raised the issue with Indian Government regulators but many advocate of free OTT talks big on TV and newspaper.Mobile operator at one end is paying billions of $ to buy spectrum followed by billions of $ on network to enable OTT players to reach their end user.
At one end mobile operators in India are losing VAS revenue, struggling to service their debt, growth, Cash flow but on a contrary the companies like Whatsapp are acquiring user behavioural pattern by offering free service but at the same time the parent company Facebook populate relevant advertisement on user Facebook account and earn billions of $.
Based on the report, Whats app handled 14 billion message on 31st Dec 2016 which clearly indicate that it inflicted a loss of 400 crore or $620 million to mobile operator. We all know that government directly or indirectly gets 33% of gross in the form taxes and other levies. It means that government lost around $200 million in revenue.
I would like to highlight that money is off mobile operator and valuation is off another company. I call it parasite approach to exploit the system. I would like to ask veterans from the industry that, Do you think the lost revenue from 14 bn is good. Think about it. We are hurting our economy and putting the job of hardworking Telecom professionals by supporting or using such applications.
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