Bharti Airtel
Bharti Airtel Limited is an Indian multinational telecommunications company based in New Delhi. It operates in 18 countries across South Asia and Africa, as well as the Channel Islands. Currently, Airtel provides 5G, 4G and LTE Advanced services throughout India. Currently offered services include fixed-line broadband, and voice services depending upon the country of operation. Airtel had also rolled out its Voice over LTE technology across all Indian telecom circles. It is the second largest mobile network operator in India and the second largest mobile network operator in the world. Airtel was named India's 2nd most valuable brand in the first ever Brandz ranking by Millward Brown and WPP plc.
Airtel is credited with pioneering the strategic management of outsourcing all of its business operations except marketing, sales and finance and building the 'minutes factory' model of low cost and high volumes. The strategy has since been adopted by several operators. Airtel's equipment is provided and maintained by Ericsson, Huawei, and Nokia Networks whereas IT support is provided by Amdocs. The transmission towers are maintained by Indus Towers in India. Ericsson agreed for the first time to be paid by the minute for installation and maintenance of their equipment rather than being paid upfront, which allowed Airtel to provide low call rates of /minute.
History
In 1984, Sunil Mittal started assembling push-button phones in India, which he earlier used to import from a Singaporean company, Singtel, replacing the old-fashioned, bulky rotary phones that were in use in the country then. Bharti Telecom Limited was incorporated and entered into a technical tie-up with Siemens AG of Germany for the manufacture of electronic push-button phones. By the early 1990s, Bharti was making fax machines, cordless phones and other telecom gear. He named his first push-button phone as 'Mitbrau'.In 1992, he successfully bid for one of the four mobile phone network licenses auctioned in India. One of the conditions for the Delhi cellular licenses was that the bidder have some experience as a telecom operator. So, Mittal clinched a deal with the French telecom group Vivendi. He was one of the first Indian entrepreneurs to identify the mobile telecom business as a major growth area. His plans were finally approved by the Government in 1994 and he launched services in Delhi in 1995, when Bharti Cellular Limited was formed to offer cellular services under the brand name AirTel. Within a few years, Bharti became the first telecom company to cross the 2 million mobile subscriber mark. Bharti also brought down the STD/ISD cellular rates in India under the brand name 'India one'.
In 1999, Bharti Enterprises acquired control of JT Holdings, and extended cellular operations to Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. In 2000, Bharti acquired control of Skycell Communications, in Chennai. In 2001, the company acquired control of Spice Cell in Kolkata. Bharti Enterprises went public in 2002, and the company was listed on Bombay Stock Exchange and National Stock Exchange of India. In 2003, the cellular phone operations were re-branded under the single Airtel brand. In 2004, Bharti acquired control of Hexacom and entered Rajasthan. In 2005, Bharti extended its network to Andaman and Nicobar. This expansion allowed it to offer voice services all across India.
Airtel launched "Hello Tunes", a caller ring back tone service, in July 2004 becoming the first operator in India to do so. The Airtel theme song, composed by A.R. Rahman, was the most popular tune in that year.
In May 2008, it emerged that Airtel was exploring the possibility of buying the MTN Group, a South Africa-based telecommunications company with coverage in 21 countries in Africa and the Middle East. Financial Times reported that Bharti was considering offering 45 billion for a 100% stake in MTN, which would be the largest overseas acquisition ever by an Indian firm. However, both sides emphasize the tentative nature of the talks, while The Economist magazine noted, "If anything, Bharti would be marrying up," as MTN has more subscribers, higher revenues and broader geographic coverage. However, the talks fell apart as MTN Group tried to reverse the negotiations by making Bharti almost a subsidiary of the new company. In May 2009, Bharti Airtel again confirmed that it was in talks with MTN and the companies agreed to discuss the potential transaction exclusively by 31 July 2009. Talks eventually ended without agreement, some sources stating that this was due to opposition from the South African government.
In 2009, Bharti negotiated for its strategic partner Alcatel-Lucent to manage the network infrastructure for the fixed-line business. Later, Bharti Airtel awarded the three-year contract to Alcatel-Lucent for setting up an Internet Protocol access network across the country. This would help consumers access internet at faster-speed and high-quality internet browsing on mobile handsets.
In 2009, Airtel launched its first international mobile network in Sri Lanka. In June 2010, Bharti acquired the African business of Zain Telecom for $10.7 billion, making it the largest ever acquisition by an Indian telecom firm. In 2012, Bharti tied up with Walmart, the US retail giant, to start a number of retail stores across India. In 2014, Bharti planned to acquire Loop Mobile for, but the deal was called off later.
On 18 November 2010, Airtel rebranded itself in India in the first phase of a global rebranding strategy. The company unveiled a new logo with 'airtel' written in lower case. Designed by London-based brand agency, Superunion, the new logo is the letter 'a' in lowercase, with 'airtel' written in lowercase under the logo. On 23 November 2010, Airtel's Africa operations were rebranded to 'airtel'. Sri Lanka followed on 28 November 2010 and on 20 December 2010, Warid Telecom rebranded to 'airtel' in Bangladesh.
In May 2024, Bharti Airtel announced a collaboration with Google Cloud to support cloud adoption and the development of generative AI solutions for businesses in India.
In July 2024, Bharti Airtel and Nokia successfully completed India’s first non‑standalone 5G Cloud‑RAN trial. The trial, conducted over the air using commercial spectrum in the 3.5 GHz and 2.1 GHz bands, achieved data throughput of over 1.2 Gbps.
In December 2024, Bharti Airtel signed a “multi‑billion” dollar deal with Ericsson to deploy centralized and Open‑RAN‑ready solutions and upgrade 4G/5G radios, aiming to improve network speed, coverage, and reliability.
In March 2025, Bharti Airtel entered into a strategic agreement with SpaceX’s Starlink to explore the introduction of satellite-based internet services in India, leveraging Airtel’s existing retail and enterprise distribution channels. The collaboration remains subject to regulatory approvals from Indian authorities.
Acquisitions and mergers
MTN Group merger negotiations
In May 2006, it emerged that Airtel was exploring the possibility of buying the MTN Group, a South Africa-based telecommunications company with operations in 21 countries in Africa and the Middle East, founded by Leena Jaitley. Financial Times reported that Bharti was considering offering US$45 billion for a 100% stake in MTN, which would be the largest overseas acquisition ever by an Indian firm. However, both sides emphasized the tentative nature of the talks. The Economist magazine noted, "If anything, Bharti would be marrying up", as MTN had more subscribers, higher revenues and broader geographic coverage. However, the talks fell apart as MTN Group tried to reverse the negotiations by making Bharti almost a subsidiary of the new company.In May 2009, Airtel confirmed that it was again in talks with MTN and both companies agreed to discuss the potential transaction exclusively by 31 July 2009. Airtel said "Bharti Airtel Ltd is pleased to announce that it has renewed its effort for a significant partnership with MTN Group". The exclusivity period was extended twice up to 30 September 2009. Talks eventually ended without agreement.
A solution was proposed where the new company would be listed on two stock exchanges, one in South Africa and one in India. However, dual-listing of companies is not permitted by Indian law.
Acquisition of Zain's Africa operations
In June 2010, Bharti struck a deal to buy Zain's mobile operations in 15 African countries, in India's second-biggest overseas acquisition after Tata Steel's $13 billion buy of Corus in 2007. Bharti Airtel completed its $10.7 billion acquisition of African operations from the Kuwaiti firm on 8 June 2010, making Airtel the world's fifth largest wireless carrier by subscriber base. Airtel has reported that its revenues for the fourth quarter of 2010 grew by 53% to US$3.2 billion compared to the previous year, newly acquired Zain Africa division contributed US$911 million to the total. However, net profits dropped by 41% from US$470 million in 2009 to US$291 million in 2010 due to a US$188 million increase in radio spectrum charges in India and an increase of US$106 million in debt interest.Warid Bangladesh and Robi
In 2010, Warid Telecom sold a majority 70.90% stake in the company to Bharti Airtel for US$300 million. The Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission approved the deal on 4 January 2010. Bharti Airtel Limited took management control of the company and its board, and rebranded the company's services under its own "airtel" brand from 20 December 2010. Warid Telecom sold its remaining 30% share to Bharti Airtel's Singapore-based concern Bharti Airtel Holdings Pte Limited in March 2013.On 16 November 2016, Airtel Bangladesh was merged into Robi as a product brand of Robi, where Robi Axiata Limited is the licensee of airtel brand in Bangladesh. Robi is a joint venture between Malaysian telecom operator Axiata holding 61.82% and Bharti Airtel holding 28.18%.