SMBs Spent Over $5 Billion On Telecom Services In 2006

Small and medium businesses in India spent over $5 billion on telecom equipment and services last year, 5% over 2005. Spending on telecom services such as cellular services, IP Centrex services, local and long distance telephony accounted for more than 90% of total telecom spending, according to the latest report by AMI Partners.

According to Nilanjana Mitra, Kolkata-based analyst at AMI-Partners, “Our survey shows that 89% of SMBs in India currently use mobile phone voice services while 11% access email via their mobile devices. Other services such as audio conferencing are also on the rise, especially among tech savvy SMBs.”

Some other connectivity devices that are gaining prominence among SMBs are IP PBX and IP phones. As Mitra observes, “SMBs are gradually gaining awareness of the advantages of IP-based communication modes over traditional telecom. Current adoption of these technologies is at an embryonic stage within SMBs in India. We expect future growth trends to be quite high and the growth rate to continue unabated for the next couple of years.”

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