Hutch-Essar gets unified licence for UP (west)

Hutchison-Essar has acquired its first unified licence for the Uttar Pradesh (west) circle.

The licence, for which the company paid Rs 30 crore, will widen its presence to 12 circles. And with this the company will once again overtake Idea Cellular, which had increased its footprint to 11 circles after the acquisition of Escotel.

Hutchison-Essar would be the 5th cellular services operator in the UP (west) circle, besides Idea (Escotel), Bharti, BSNL and Reliance Infocomm. At present, there are nearly 9 lakh subscribers in this circle.

With the acquisition of the new licence, Hutchison-Essar is aiming to double its national subscriber base to eight million in 2004.

Taking the licence for UP (west) circle made sense for the company since it already has presence in other circles of Gujarat, Haryana, Rajasthan, Punjab, UP (east) and Delhi.

However, Hutchison-Essar's rivals "" Bharti, BSNL and Reliance Infocomm"" have presence in more number of circles leaving it at the fourth spot in terms of coverage and subscriber base.

Asim Ghosh, director, Hutchison-Essar, said, "We are increasing our presence in the north with the acquisition of the UP (west) licence and the roll-out of our network in Punjab. We doubled our subscriber base last year and expect the same this year."