You are on page 1of 12

Bharti Enterprises, India's leading telecom conglomerate, has been

at the forefront of technology and has revolutionised telecommunications


with its world-class products and services.  Established in 1976, Bharti has
been a pioneering force in the telecom sector with many firsts and
innovations to its credit.   

Bharti Airtel was established as Bharti Tele-Ventures Limited in 1985. This


telecommunication company is a joint stock holding enterprise
headquartered in New Delhi. Bharti Airtel, commonly called 'Airtel' is among
largest mobile service operator with a subscriber base of nearly 75 million.
Airtel has a submarine cable landing station in Chennai connecting this
South Indian city to Singapore. 

Mobile services – Based on number of customers Bharti Airtel is largest


mobile service operator in India. This company offers mobile services
based on GSM technology. For convenience of its customers Bharti Airtel
has both pre- paid and post paid facilities. 
Enterprise business – Bharti Airtel provides integrated services
comprising mobile, telephone, broadband, data and connectivity services
internationally as well as nationally for small, medium and large scale
enterprises. Its carrier service provides network connectivity through optic
fiber over a distance of more than 35,000 km. Bharti Airtel is a member of
South East Asia – Middle East – Western Europe – 4 consortium which
includes 15 global telecommunication service providers.
Airtel Telemedia Services – This company offers high speed broadband
services through landlines in 94 cities. 

Bharti has always believed in creating strong partnerships with its joint
venture partners. Today SingTel, Singapore and Warburg Pincus, USA are
Bharti’s lead joint venture partners. Bharti’s other joint venture partners
include Telia, Sweden, AIF Funds Management Ltd., Mauritius,
International Finance Corporation, USA and New York Life International,
USA. 
Bharti has many firsts to its credit, ranging from being the first cellular service in
Delhi, first Indian company to provide comprehensive telecom services outside
India (Seychelles), fastest growing VSAT company in India, and first multinational
Internet Service Provider.  Bharti also created history with the launch of India’s
first private sector fixed line service in the state of Madhya Pradesh, which is
today India's largest private basic telephone service.
AirTel, the premier mobile service brand from Bharti has defined the cellular
business through continuous marketing and technological innovations,
consistently setting new benchmarks for the Indian mobile industry.  AirTel has
the unique distinction of being chosen India’s best cellular service four years in a
row by receiving the Techies award in 1997, 1998, 1999 & 2000.   

The most significant development in Bharti’s growth drive has been it’s recent
wins in the 4th cellular licence bidding process.  Bharti has today emerged as
India’s largest mobile services company with a footprint that spans across 15
states, 1.8 million sq. k.m. covering 700 million people.  Bharti plans to offer
nationwide broadband & long distance services in addition to providing world-
class fixed line services in Delhi, Haryana, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu & Madhya
Pradesh. Today Bharti’s telecom services footprint encompasses the entire
telecom value chain and runs from Himachal Pradesh in the north to Tamil Nadu
in the south, from Mumbai in the west to Kolkata in the east.  Today, Bharti is
India’s largest telecom services company in the private sector. 

Bharti Enterprises also manufactures and exports telephone terminals and


cordless phones.  Apart from being the largest manufacturer of telephone
instruments, it is also the first company to export its products to the USA.

Bharti Enterprises is today recognized as a true infrastructure builder of the


nation.  Amongst it’s series of rewards & recognitions, Bharti was recently
awarded the first National Infrastructure Development Finance Corporation
(IDFC) award for “Excellence in Infrastructure - 2000”. 

Bharti Tele-Ventures was incorporated on July 7, 1995 as a company with limited


liability under the Companies Act, for promoting telecommunications services.
Bharti Tele-Ventures received certificate for commencement of business on
January 18, 1996. The Company was initially formed as a wholly-owned
subsidiary of Bharti Telecom Limited. The chronology of events since Bharti Tele-
Ventures was incorporated in 1995 is as follows:

Calendar year & Events

1995
- Bharti Cellular launched cellular services'AirTel'in Delhi

1997
- British Telecom acquired a 21.05% equity interest in Bharti Cellular

- Bharti Telenet obtained a license for providing fixed-line services in Madhya


Pradesh circle

- Bharti Telecom and British Telecom formed a 51% : 49% joint venture, Bharti
BT, for providing VSAT services

1998
- Bharti Telecom and British Telecom formed a 51% : 49% joint venture, Bharti BT
Internet for providing Internet services

- First Indian private fixed-line services launched in Indore in the Madhya Pradesh
circle on June 4, 1998 by Bharti Telenet thereby ending fixed-line services
monopoly of DoT (now BSNL)

2000 - Bharti Tele-Ventures acquired an effective equity interest of 40.5% in


Bharti Mobinet (formerly Skycell Communications), the cellular services provider
in Chennai

- Bharti Tele-Ventures acquired a 30.2% equity interest of Telecom Italia in Bharti


Telenet and 18.8% from Bharti Telecom thereby making Bharti Telenet a 100%
subsidiary of Bharti Tele-Ventures

2001
- Bharti Telesonic entered into a joint venture, Bharti Aquanet, with SingTel for
establishing a submarine cable landing station at Chennai
- Bharti Cellular acquired a 100% equity interest in Bharti Mobitel (formerly Spice
Cell ), the cellular services provider in Kolkata

- Punjab license restored to Bharti Mobile by the DoT and migration


to NTP - 1999 accepted

- Bharti Cellular entered into license agreements to provide cellular services in


eight new circles following the fourth operator cellular license bidding process

- Bharti Telenet entered into license agreements to provide fixed-line


services in the Haryana, Delhi, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka circles

- Bharti Telesonic entered into a license agreement with the DoT to provide
national long distance services across India
- Bharti Telesonic launched national long distance services under the brand
name of IndiaOne

- Bharti Telenet launched fixed line services in Haryana under the brand name of
TouchTel.

2002
- Comes out with issue of 18.53 crore equity shares through book
building route with a floor price of Rs 45 per share, received bid
for 18.55 crore shares. Through the issue, it becomes the first
company in India to come out with 100% book building issue

-Issue price fixed at Rs 45 per share, floor price fixed by the


company. Raises Rs 834 crore

-Shares listed on BSE, NSE and DSE, opens at 11% premium to its
issue price of Rs 45

-Enters into a 5-year agreement with Escotel and ETL of the Escorts
group to contract leased line connectivity for its cellular operations
2003

-Airtel breaks interconnectivity with Tata Teleservices in Andhra


Pradesh Circle

-Company accorded its approval for amalgamation of its subsidiary


companies viz: Bharti Telenet Ltd, Bharti Telesonic Ltd, Bharti
Broadband Networks Ltd and Bharti Comtel Ltd through scheme of
Amalgamation. The merged entity would be renamed as Bharti Infotel
Ltd
-Bharti Cellular unveils CareTouch service

-Bharti Group's cellular brand Airtel has unveiled free multimedia


messaging services (MMS) for its customers. The company has also
rolled out pan-India GPRS (General Packet Radio Services) for its
corporate subscribers

-AirTel Subscribers exceed 3 million mark

-AirTel unveils RAD system

-Bharti TeleVentures announces the completion of merger with Bharti


Mobitel

-Bharti Mobitel Ltd. merged with Bharti Cellular Ltd.

-AirTel, Touchtel jointly offer freeTouchtel land line for post-paid


Airtel connection

-Offers 0-1-2, a new cellular package for the customers, which means
zero charges on incoming calls, Re 1 on mobile-to-mobile outgoing
calls, Rs 2 on mobile-to-mobile STD calls

-Rolls out Airtel messenger service

-AirTel offers bundled handset, connection package for Rs 5715

-Bharti cellular, wholly owned subsidiary of Bharti Tele-Ventures,


increases its stake to 100% in Bharti Mobile

-Iinks distribution pact with Hathway Cable. With this alliance,


Bharti is said to be the first telecom firm to step into television
distribution services

-Gets 14th place among top 25 Cos in India


-Bharti Tele-Ventures enters into an agreement with Telesystem
(Mauritius) Pvt. Ltd

-Bharti Tele-Ventures enters into a three year service agreement with


Ericsson

-Bharti Tele-Ventures (BTVL) has signed and received unified access


service licence to provide GSM services in five circles including
Uttar Pradesh (East), West Bengal & Andaman Nicobar, Orissa, Bihar
and Jammu & Kashmir. The licence has been granted to Bharti Cellular
Ltd (BCL), the cellular arm and subsidiary of BTVL.

-Airtel announces the signing of the first-ever bilateral roaming


agreement between an Indian mobile service provider and its
counterpart in Pakistan. This facility will be available to pre-paid
as well as post-paid customers. AirTel's roaming agreement is with
Mobilink, the only GSM cellular service provider in Pakistan

-Acquires switching systems from Tekelec that will give a


technological edge to the company

March 2004: IT Outsourcing


• On-demand agreement with IBM for 10 years
• IBM will be paid a share of Bharti’s revenues
- IBM modeled its revenues on a forecast of customers
and employees
• Adjustment for scale (IBM share will fall with growth)
• SLAs stipulate penalties as a function of the criticality of
the system to Bharti’s business

-Signs MoU to join the South East Asia - Middle East - Western Europe
4 (SEA-ME-WE-4) consortium along with 15 other global telecom
operators.

-Bharti Tele-Ventures has struck a deal with Shyam Telecom to buy out
the latter's 67.5 per cent stake in cellular services company Hexacom
for Rs 430 crore.

-Bharti Tele garners 0 m via FCCBs


-The Bharti group finalised a Rs 500-crore deal to share its
national long-distance (STD) network with VSNL in a first-of-its-kind
accord between two top telecom service providers in a bid to optimise
capacities in the NLD segment.

- Internet gateway and services provider, Videsh Sanchar Nigam Ltd.


(VSNL) has signed a Right to Use (RoU) agreement to deploy mobile
telephony major, Bharti Tele-Ventures' existing National Long
Distance (NLD) backbone.

-Bharti Tele-Ventures Ltd has awarded a million equipment


contract to Swedish telecoms company Ericsson

-Bharti Televentures announced formation of a new strategic business


unit to offer various telecom and IT services through a single
contact

-Airtel ties up with Micro Tech to set up 'Mcops' vehicle security


system

-AirTel inks pact with JP Mobile

2005
-Bharti Tele-Ventures launches under sea cable system

2006

-Airtel joins hand with Microsoft

-Bharti Airtel Ltd has informed that Microsoft and the Company
announced a strategic partnership that will offer a range of software
and services for small and medium businesses (SMBs) in India.

-Bharti Airtel Ltd on Nov 8, announced a first-of-its-kind alliance


with the Adani Group for establishing an end-to-end modern
telecommunication network infrastructure for the latter's
multi-sector special economic zone (SEZ), located near Mundra Port in
Kutch district of Gujarat.
2007

-Bharti Airtel, telecom major, has come out with a slew of


initiatives including buying out SingTel's 50 per cent stake in joint
venture under sea cable company Network i2i for 0 million.

-Bharti Airtel on Feb 11, has been awarded QCI-DL Shah National Award
on Economics of Quality.

-Bharti Airtel Ltd has announced the following changes in the


operational leadership structure and roles in the Company effective
April 01, 2007.

-Bharti Airtel Ltd on April 01, 2007, has announced the reduction in
International Long Distance Tariffs (ISD) for all its mobile
customers in India.

-Airtel signs agreement with HTC for touch screen mobile.

2008

- Nokia Siemens Networks on Jan 3 declared that it has been awarded a


multi million euro contract from Bharti Airtel Ltd for deployment of a
single interactive voice response (IVR) platform across 23 circles.
The three-year turnkey contract comprises designing, planning,
systems integration and optimisation services to raise overall
customer experience. The new IVR solution will enable Airtel to
deliver services such as voice SMS, televoting, call management
services, caller ring back tone and voice portal on a faster
time-to-market basis and, therefore, reduce OPEX costs.

- Bharti Airtel Ltd on February 13, 2008 has announced that it has
achieved the 60 million customer mark. This landmark has catapulted
Bharti Airtel into the club of top mobile operators in the world in
terms of subscriber base. The 60 million customer base covers mobile
as well as fixed line and broadband customers.

- Bharti Airtel tied up with US-based Apple Inc to bring the popular
GSM-based iPhone in the country.
- Bharti Airtel Ltd has forged a technology alliance with Infosys
Technologies Ltd to launch its Direct-to-Home (DTH) television
services. Infosys, through its digital convergence platform, will
offer a suite of products including devices, application servers and
interactive applications for Airtel's DTH services.

2009

- Bharti Airtel HAS signed a five-year managed services deal valued


at 0 million with Alcatel Lucent for its fixed-line and broadband
operations.

- Bharti Airtel launched the 'Airtel Advantage' initiative. The


initiative is aimed at offering the added advantage to Airtel
customers to be in touch with each other at an affordable rate of 50
paise per minute, be it a national long distance call (STD) or a
local call.

- In order to create products and services for the small, medium and
large enterprises, Bharti Airtel and Cisco announced a strategic
business alliance. The alliance would combine the strengths of
Airtel's network service and Cisco' Internet Protocol (IP)
technologies.

- Bharti Airtel - Airtel and mChek announce milestone of One Million


users; introduce a broad range of new mCommerce services.

2010
Sunil Mittal-owned Bharti Airtel, has spread its operations to Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Africa and
Seychelles. In Africa, where it acquired operations of mobile carrier Zain

- Bharti Airtel submitted its bid for 3G spectrum, the auction for
which starts from April 9.

- Bharti Airtel has partnered with US-based software maker VMware


Inc. It has done this in order to focus on the cloud-based managed
computer services market.

- Bharti Airtel, India's No.1 cellular carrier has won broadband


spectrum in four circles. Earlier, Bharti has said that it had tied
up the entire financing requirement of .3 bn for the planned buy,
through a series of banks.

Bharti Airtel Adds Mobile Payments


February 6th, 2011 | Author: Gary Kim
India’s largest mobile operator, Bharti Airtel, is offering its customers the
ability to make payments through mobile phones.

Bharti Airtel customers can deposit cash in their “airtel money” accounts at
retail locations, then make payments at retail sites and pay utilities using
their mobile phones. The merchants and utilities have to be on the Bharti
Airtel network, and be part of the money transfer program.

The feature is as much about customer loyalty and value-added services


as it is about incremental revenue Airtel can make by sponsoring the
program.

Outsourcing of all key operational functions, a concept pioneered by Bharti


Airtel, is the key to the telco’s low-cost high-volume business model that
enabled it to build a subscriber base of around 150 million customers in
India.

On 23 February 2011, Bharti Airtel launched the Europe-India gateway cable


system, along with 16 other global telecom firms. A 15,000 kilometre long cable,
between Mumbai and London.

On 27 February 2011, Bharti Airtel launched its speech recognition based service,
'One Number, One Voice'.[34]

in Wal-Mart-Bharati Enterprises Ltd joint venture, Wal-Mart can benefit


from the knowledge Bharati Enterprises has of India's culture, business
opportunities, and other issues that only a local firm would be
familiar Since a joint venture usually entails a 50/50 stake, both
companies invest significant resources, talents, and commitment to the
new firm. This provides both companies advantages in terms of sharing
development costs and risks.
Wal-Mart risks giving Bharati Enterprises some of its key competencies
that give it a competitive advantage over other firms. Bharati
Enterprises, a large conglomerate with no experience in retail industry
would learn the operations, skills, and other competencies that give Wal-
Mart an advantage, and in turn become a potential threat to Wal-Mart not
only in the Indian market, but also in other foreign markets as well.

IBM also handles part of Bharti’s customer care operations in India

India’s top mobile phone firm Bharti Airtel said it will award call centre
contracts for its African operations to IBM, Tech Mahindra and Spanco,
marking the second significant step in replicating its hugely-successful
outsourcing model in that continent. five-year contract was worth around
$500 million, with IBM and Spanco sharing most of the spoils.

Other stakeholders in Bharti Airtel include Sony-Ericsson, Nokia - and Sing Tel,
with whom they hold a strategic alliance. This means that the business has access
to knowledge and technology from other parts of the telecommunications world.

The company has covered the entire Indian nation with its network. This has
underpinned its large and rising customer base

The company is investing in its operation in 120,000 to 160,000 small villages


every year. It sees that less well-off consumers may only be able to afford a few
tens of Rupees per call, and also so that the business benefits are scalable - using
its 'Matchbox' strategy.

Bharti Airtel is embarking on another joint venture with Vodafone Essar and Idea
Cellular to create a new independent tower company called Indus Towers. This
new business will control more than 60% of India's network towers. IPTV is
another potential new service that could underpin the company's long-term
strategy.
The businesses at Bharti Airtel have been structured into three individual strategic
business units (SBU's) - Mobile Services, Airtel Telemedia Services & Enterprise
Services.

You might also like