Vodafone Idea expands footprint to rural Bengal

Aiming to reach people outside cities and major towns, Vodafone Idea on Monday said it has been aggressively expanding its retail footprint in rural India, including in West Bengal.

The private telecom operator added over 130 new-format ‘Vi Shops’ in tier III locations across 20 districts in West Bengal within 45 days, it said.

Till now 330 Vi Shops have been rolled out in the state since November 2022. Nationally the number of such stores is 1,100 in 18 states as of February.

The modern design of the new format Vi Shops aligns with signature elements that define existing Vi Stores in urban locations. The shops offer the entire bouquet of Vi prepaid products and services.

“We have taken a renewed approach to our rural retail strategy and moved closer to customers by introducing the concept of Vi Shops across multiple small towns and tier III markets.

“We have scaled up to 330 Vi Shops in Rural West Bengal, under one of the fastest retail expansion exercises in the country,” said Vodafone Idea COO Abhijit Kishore.

The company said its average revenue per user, a key performance indicator of telecom operators, improved by 17.4 per cent on a year-over-year basis to Rs 135 during the December 2022 quarter from Rs 115 a year ago on account of tariff hikes and migration of subscribers to unlimited tariff plans.

As of December, VI has a subscriber base of 22.86 crores. PTI