What drives Indian mobile service market: Policies or users?

• Published in: Telematics and informatics Vol. 50; p. 101383
• Main Authors: Gupta, Ruchita, Jain, Karuna
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Oxford Elsevier Ltd 01.07.2020; Elsevier Science Ltd
• Subjects: Cellular telephony; Diffusion; Economic development; Impact analysis; India; Integration; Macro-policies; Micro-user; Mobile service; Policies; Telephony; Integration; Micro-user; Diffusion; Mobile service; Macro-policies; India
• ISSN: 0736-5853; 1879-324X
• DOI: 10.1016/j.tele.2020.101383

•Interaction of macro and micro factors on Indian mobile service market is studied.•An integrated framework of macro and micro interactions is developed and validated.•Extent of diffusion depends on extent of interaction between macro and micro factors.•Telecom policies and programmes in India are more driven by the needs of end users. Mobile telephony and its services have demonstrated direct impact on economic growth and social development. Offering users opportunities to keep pace with the rapid shifts in the mobile technology paradigm—from 1G to 2G, 3G, 4G, and now 5G—has also enabled businesses to earn appropriate returns on their investment. Existing literature has considered macro (policies) and micro factors (end-user level) in isolation to study diffusion, especially in the early phases of technology evolution. This study presents a framework which is a novel attempt to jointly evaluate the influence of macro and micro factors (i.e., governmental policies, and other market and user dynamics) on the diffusion of mobile telephony and its services in India. Developments in the Indian telecommunication sector (1997–2013) are used to develop the framework, and the recent developments (from latter half of year 2013–2018) are then used to validate the framework. The framework offers interesting insights on what drives Indian mobile service market showing interactions between the two sets of factors through a cause effect loop.