Although Sanjay Kapoor, CEO, Bharti Cellular Limited, insists that the company believes in chasing the customer and not the competitor, AirTel is nevertheless gearing up to compete with Orange after it enters the market in a tie-up with Essar.

For the month of April, the agenda is adding new applications "to enrich the short message services launched three months ago," informs Sanjay Kapoor, CEO, Bharti Cellular.

This includes city-based information (about restaurants, police stations, important phone numbers in an area, etc.); travel schedules for both domestic as well as international journeys (via air and railways); and vertical addressal of content for niche segments like doctors, lawyers, engineers, architects, women, etc. The company has tied up with "CIMS-Bio Gaurd" to provide SMS based services for doctors from all the different fields of medicine, like Cardiology, Dermitology, ENT, Gynaecology, etc.

Doctors can type a key word on their cellphones to get the latest developments in the chosen area. This ready-reckoner provides latest medical information to the doctors, including medical news, drug launches, clinical trials, seminars, conferences, abstracts from articles, etc.

For city-based information and travel schedules, the company has tied up with a Website called "lookupdelhi.com", adds Kapoor. "We will be ready to launch all these services by the end of April," he informs.

Apart from this, the company has also tied up with a number of companies to launch many promotion schemes and services in March. It tied up with the ICICI Bank to provide services like credit card payment, payment of cellular bills through the Internet, and mobile banking - AirTel also tied up with HDFC bank for mobile banking.

However, chances are that adding newer services alone might not be enough to ward off competition. Orange, which according to industry sources, had sparked off a price war in the Bombay cellular market, by cutting the rental tariff from Rs 475 to Rs 395, might do something similar in Delhi as well.While Kapoor admits that if Orange starts a price war, AirTel will have no option but to follow suit, he does not look forward to the prospect: "A price war did not help Orange in Bombay. It has not grown the market. And Orange is still not the leader in Bombay."

"Price cannot be a differentiator in a duo-poly, specially when the industry is still bleeding. Instead of that, you should try to give more services to the customers," he adds.

Meanwhile, AirTel can take comfort from the fact that it still has a comfortable lead over Essar, in terms of the number of subscribers. According to the subscriber list compiled by the Cellular Operators Association of India, in February, AirTel had 1,71,213 subscribers, while Essar had 1,43,307 subscribers.

Further, AirTel, which has already crossed 1,90,000 subscribers is all set to achieve the 2 lakh mark by May, thereby becoming the largest metro operator in the country, explains Kapoor.

According to him, one of the biggest stimulants for the growth in the number of subscribers is the pre-paid "Magic" card, which was launched by the company in January 1999. "Since then, from a base of around 7,000 subscribers (on cash cards), the number has grown to 80,000 plus subscribers," adds Kapoor.