India Illustrates Principle: Competition is Good, Excessive Competition Is Not

Mobile and fixed network service providers sometimes point out that excessive competition or excessive regulation actually can depress willingness to invest and upgrade networks. And mobile service providers have learned the hard way that overpaying for spectrum likewise can create stress that limits investment into network infrastructure.

That seems to be the case in the Indian mobile market, where Indian service providers will invest a substantially lower percentage of their revenue back into their networks, compared to service providers in China, Indonesia and the Philippines, according to research from ratings agency Fitch Ratings.