New Jio phone may garner 100 million users, says BoFA Securities

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

JioBharat internet-enabled phone could garner around 100 million users in the next two-three years, BoFA Securities said in a research note. «If RIL/Karbonn are able to scale up production of these phones, then we see the phone to have potential and could garner around 100 million users in next 2-3 years.

We find both VIL (Vodafone Idea) & Bharti (Airtel) feature phones users vulnerable and see upside risks to Jio net adds,» Bofa Securities said on Wednesday.Jefferies separately said in a report that feature phone users at the end of their device life are likely to save 26% on their mobile spends (device plus service), but the users who do not want to change their handset may not switch. «This leads to an annual addressable market of around 60-65 million users for JioBharat and we expect Jio to gain 55 million subscribers by Mar-26.» As per estimates by analysts, Bharti Airtel has more than 130 million active 2G subscribers and more than 100 million paying voice subscribers, implying a 40-50% share among the 250 million feature-phone market.

Jefferies said Airtel's dominant position in the feature phone market could lead to higher user losses. «We expect Bharti to witness voice subscriber churn of 17 million by Mar-26 leading to a 1-4% cut to our FY24-26 India-mobile subscriber estimates.»