Total appearances: 3
Analyst debut: 2012
For a second consecutive year,Sunil Tirumalaiof Credit Suisse captures the No. 2 position on this list. He has a bearish outlook on the industry’s telecommunications operators, forecasting “significant risk” from the anticipated launch in 2015 of Reliance Jio Infocomm, an unlisted subsidiary of Mumbai-based conglomerate Reliance Industries. Jio is planning to invest 700 billion rupees ($11.4 billion) before its services commence next year. “The scale of investment and capacity creation by Jio as a new entrant is unprecedented,” says Tirumalai. “Given the nature of the sector, I see this impacting the revenues, margins and [capital expenditure] numbers for the operators adversely.” He estimates that Jio’s impact will be felt starting in early 2015. As a result, he maintains a negative stance on top players in that segment: New Delhi’s Bharti Airtel; and Idea Cellular and Reliance Communications, both headquartered in Mumbai. At the same time, however, the analyst notes that “the entry of a new operator with a large new network is great news for the telecom tower sector.” Accordingly, he assigns an outperform rating to select major names in the group, including Gurgaon-based infrastructure provider Bharti Infratel. The entry of Jio, which has signed sharing deals with nearly all the tower companies in the domestic market, could “trigger a rise in capex and a network rollout by the incumbent operators, which could lead to accelerated demand for tower companies,” Tirumalai explains.