Cellphone business in the country has mushroomed from 1.2 million in 2002 to 52 million in 2007 with the arrival of Telenor and Warid after Mobilink, Ufone, Paktel and Instaphone. Mobilink has over 23 million clients followed by Ufone with 11 million, Warid with eight million and Telenor with nine million, a private television news channel reported.
The activation tax has also been reduced to Rs 500 from a high of Rs 2,000. For every Rs 100 consumed by a subscriber only Rs 79 is used for telecommunication service.
The prices of telecom services have reduced significantly. For instance, the rate of a local call on the Mobilink network in 2004 was Rs 5.75 per minute. Today a NWD on the same network costs as low as Rs 1.80 per minute.
The liberalisation of the telecommunication market led to a more efficient back-end infrastructure and lowered input cost for the customers. Increased competition led to a reduction in prices as two new operators entered the market.