Airtel has been asked to modify or take down its latest ad campaign where it claims to be India’s fastest mobile network by citing findings by Ookla, an internet speed testing service. The Advertising Standards Council of India has said that the ad was misleading and given the company time till April 11 to comply with its directive. Bharti Airtel has, however, decided to appeal against the order that was passed after Reliance Jio moved the ad regulator seeking action, reported PTI.
“We have advised the advertiser to modify appropriately or to withdraw the said TVC and the website advertisement by April 11, 2017,” the ASCI said.
Airtel, however, defended its campaign and said it was based on findings by Ookla. ”We have shared all supporting facts with ASCI and strongly believe that our campaign is compliant with all guidelines,” the company said. “We will be happy to provide more details, if required, and hope ASCI will reconsider its decision.” Ookla has also supported Airtel in the dispute and stood by its findings.
However, the ASCI has held that the ad does not mention that Airtel was found to be the country’s fastest mobile network between July 2016 and December 2016. “When analyzing data for 2017 to date, Airtel is still the clear leader,” Ookla said. “It is worth noting that after correcting for the Android limitation, Airtel’s lead over Jio increases for all aforementioned date ranges.”
The ASCI has also questioned the method used by the company to reach the conclusion and the diversity and size of their sample. “While the advertiser submitted an Ookla certificate, they did not provide an explicit test methodology to substantiate that the method is robust to capture that the sample; and is representative and comparable across operators, geographies and consumers,” ASCI observed.
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