The Indian operator, which is the nation’s largest in terms of subscribers, is reportedly looking at merging its core mobile, satellite, TV, broadband and fixed-line businesses.
The reports follow an interview with Bharti’s founder, chairman and MD, Sunil Bharti Mittal on the FT.com, in which he also said that any restructuring would have minimal impact on the company’s staff.
The company has been noticeably active over the last 12 months following its $10.7 million takeover of Zain’s African assets in June 2011. The deal gave Bharti operations in 15 African countries and the company quickly signified its ambitions for the African market by also overseeing the lighting of the East Africa Submarine System (EASSy) and concluding a huge outsourcing deal with IBM to help manage its African operations – all of which was examined in-depth by Guy Matthews in October (click here).
Yet by May 2011, Capacity had reported that Bharit airtel’s annual report had shown a profit loss of 32.6% which the company accredited to its takeover of Zain’s African operations (click here). Yet barely a few weeks later, the company showed no signs of slowing down its investment by revealing plans to invest a further $1 billion into its African operations (click here).
With the company investing so heavily in its African operations during this period, it seems this could have caused a rethink of how it positions its operations both globally and domestically. The Capacity team will be keeping a close eye on what the Indian operator will do next.
