India is to delay the implementation of Mobile Number Portability (MNP) until the end of the year following delays at the networks and the regulator. The operators have faced problems installing the necessary equipment, and the regulator has still to set out the tariffs for the porting service.

The MNP facility was due to be made available at the end of September, but will now launch on December 31st.

A statement from the Department of Telecom read: "The implementation of MNP is under progress. However, this required customisation and upgradation of the existing network to be capable of providing the MNP service. Certain technical and commercial issues related to it are also being resolved."

"All this requires considerable time and effort. Therefore, it has been decided by the Department of Telecom to extend the date of implementation of MNP in Metro Category A service areas to December 31, 2009 in the first phase,"

The Department of Telecommunications guidelines envisaged geographical division of the country into two Number Portability Zones (zone 1 & zone 2), each consisting of 11 licensed service areas. Subsequently, one operator in each zone was selected. Syniverse Technologies was granted licence for operating in Zone 1 (Northern and Western India) and MNP Interconnection Telecom Solutions was granted licence for MNP Service Zone 2 (Eastern and Southern India, based on the selection parameters set in the guidelines for MNP service license.

According to a recent Nielsen survey, it seems that close to one in five (18%) Indian mobile phone subscribers could change their mobile operator when Mobile Number Portability is introduced into the market.

According to Nielsen, high spenders, postpaid subscribers and business subscribers show a greater tendency to switch if Mobile Number Portability is introduced. Prepaid, low and medium spend users are not motivated to switch. Postpaid subscribers have almost double the minutes of usage compared to pre-paid subscribers and the incidence of data application usage is also higher among postpaid and high spenders. Vodafone has the highest postpaid subscriber base in India.