TIL Desk/Business/New Delhi/ After slugging it out in metros and big cities, the fight for customers among operators has now shifted to rural and small towns as telecoms target to get a pie of the 500 million strong customer base, which currently uses feature phones but aspires to own a smartphone.
Reliance Jio was the first one to tap the feature phone customer base with the launch of Rs 1,500 4G-enabled feature phone in July this year.
The Mukesh Ambani-owned company, which had already rattled the incumbent operators with its free and cheap offerings, led to the shift towards this segment of customers as the market in metros and other big cities is almost saturated.
The country’s top operator Bharti Airtel has already announced a bundling partnership with local handset maker Karbonn, wherein the Sunil Bharti Mittal-led company is offering a smartphone for an “effective price” of Rs 1,399.
The company has made it clear that going forward, many such partnerships will be forged as it looks to provide a smartphone at an affordable price to customers, who wish to upgrade but face financial constraints to do it. According to an official of Airtel, the company is targeting to convert customers, who currently use feature phones and aspire to own a smartphone.
