Interview with NEW BSNL CMD Shri Anupam Shrivastava

March 31, 2014

 

Government-owned Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) is going through interesting times. On one hand, the company is all set to merge with its sister company, Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited (MTNL) and on the other hand it is getting ready to welcome its new Chairman and Managing Director. BSNL's Director-Consumer Mobility, Anupam Shrivastava would be taking charge of the company as its CMD on July 1, 2014.

In his first interview, Anupam Shrivastava talks at length about his vision for the company, the road ahead on the enterprise side and how merger with MTNL will change things.

Here are the excerpts from the interview:

On The Vision Ahead

,I am supposed to take over as CMD of BSNL from July 1, 2014 based on approval from the government. What we see now is a loss of Rs 8,000 crore although it has stabilized in the last two-to-three years. However, if you analyse the profit and loss account you will realize that most of this loss is coming from depreciation. It is probably a silver lining that we are not making operational loss. We are more or less meeting our revenue,.

 

Having said that the prime focus before us is to convert the Rs 8,000 crore loss into profit sooner than later. Our P&L should improve and we again see ourselves as a company that makes profit. Our prime focus would be on making profit and then we would be looking at profits of Rs 8,000 to Rs 10,000 crore. Our topline right now stands between Rs 26,000 crore and Rs 27,000 crore. So our turnover should go up to between Rs 36,000 crore and Rs 37,000 crore. And it is not impossible since BSNL has a lot of inherent capabilities.

 

We would be focusing on three core areas: mobile data communication, landline broadband and leasing out of infrastructure. We are confident that if we focus on these areas, which are showing positive trends then we should be able to generate the kind of topline that would put us back on the path of profitability.

 

We are focusing on making our company data centric, we are focusing on changing our network to carry out the data. We would like to emerge as a company which is a very powerful data infrastructure provider. We are well positioned for that because we have landline assets.

 

We have around seven lakh kilometer of fiber with us and if we are able to converge this capacity with our mobile capacity I think we will emerge very strong. Similarly, we have tower assets, passive infrastructure, and we also have factory assets.

On Monetizing Optical Fiber Assets

Monetizing the optical assets is a very strategic decision. We need to ensure that if and when we monetize our optical infrastructure we are very careful in taking decisions. Should it be required we would also go for monetization of optical fiber network. Our optical fiber network is our biggest strength. As far as passive infrastructure is concerned there is no doubt in our mind that it is expected to bring us a lot of revenue.

 

On Mobile Data Uptake

One parameter that we are watching is our thorough put on a day-to-day basis. It used to be 75 to 80 terabytes and has now gone up to 120 to 130 terabytes. So there is a jump of 50 to 60 percent. Market has that demand and hunger, if we are improving on our connectivity, our IP addresses, if we are making our radios compatible to the data, we find that whatever we do is consumed. That shows the hunger for data in the market.

 

Last two years, some kind of turnaround has happened and we are again in a position to improve on our mobile network. We are putting up the latest mobile network in all the zones. So now as far as network availability and capacity is concerned we have got things and networks in place, we have got orders in place and things are being rolled out at a very fast pace.

 

On Enterprise Business

The moment we talk about the enterprise business we realize that we are not present in Delhi and Mumbai. This synergy will come when BSNL and MTNL merge. However, the enterprise business will not take off only with the merger of two entities. It requires vision and we should do away with the way we work, our legacy mindset. Along with the synergy between BSNL and MTNL we need to generate new skills and new temperament. There is no dearth of business in the enterprise segment. Market is looking at us to provide that service, especially the Government sector. We ourselves lag and that is why we don,t get it.

 

On Challenge From Private Telcos In The Enterprise Space Obviously

the challenge is going to be there. The business will not come walking to you. You have to make effort and prove yourself. Gone are the days when you can just provide the service and you don,t provide customer service. Now we have our technical infrastructure in place, we have 100 percent redundancy in all our networks with the result that we are in a position to meet the SLA requirements, which is prime. We are focusing on both the government and private sectors, because that is where the business is.

 

On BSNL+MTNL Synergy

BSNL network is very good and matches the standards. But when we come to Delhi and Mumbai. MTNL in the past was not in a position to invest and in fact they are not in a position to invest even now, so they need to improve their services now. The perception of our services is affected because of MTNL,s service in Delhi and Mumbai. The merging of BSNL and MTNL will help in the sense that MTNL,s network in Delhi and Mumbai can be improved without much investment. The coming together of BSNL and MTNL will also help in saving us a lot of revenue. We are raising bills, that part will go away. On that bill we are raising taxes, that part will go away. Union is not opposing this as a principle,see BSNL is not having much debt if you compare it with other telcos like Bharti, Vodafone and Idea. MTNL,s debt is too high and has almost eaten away their net worth. They [Union] feel that MTNL,s debt,s impact should not come in such a way that it spoils your overall structure. It is a very valid concern. The debt should be either taken care off or written off. The debt should not impact our strengths. The talks of merger between the two are at a very advanced stage and should come through in the next six months. MTNL would be merging in BSNL and I feel Bharat Sanchar Nigam is a beautiful name, so we would like to continue with that.

 

On Controversy Surrounding CDMA spectrum

We have been given two carriers in all the circles and Government wants us to surrender one carrier. We evolved with two carriers. It just so happened that CDMA subscribers shrunk. However, if you look at the system it is based on two carriers. Now we have to transit and move to one carrier and that requires some investment. It is also going to be time consuming. Government does not want us to surrender the services since it knows that CDMA provides services to rural poor in fact.

 

On Offering Application-Specific Service Plans

We should be in a position to ensure that our customers get the data service they require. For instance, if you want to only access Facebook while other person only wants Twitter, then we should be in a position to provide that. We don,t have this functionality right now but we are trying to get that. We should be in a position to offer function-wise data services.

On Leasing Towers To Reliance Jio

We are the second largest tower infrastructure company after Indus I think. Our towers are being given to Idea, Airtel and other private operators. Proposal is there from Reliance Jio and we are actively considering towers to be given.