The country’s leading telecom service provider Bharti Airtel said that it was optimistic about the forthcoming spectrum auctions and hopes to defend its existing position. Auctions are starting on Wednesday.
“We already have acquired 1800 MHz spectrum in the last auction. We are in a very happy situation amongst all operators. We hope to defend our existing spectrum,” Sunil Mittal, Chairman, Bharti Airtel, told reporters here on the sidelines of Mobile World Congress.
He, however, felt that the Centre should vacate more spectrum for faster digitisation in the country. “Spectrum, pricing, and all are done now. Put more spectrum on offer because there is scarcity.”
The company is happy that the Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad has said that the Centre would provide more spectrum (for example 15 MHz from Defence).
Talking about the partnership with China Mobile here, Mittal said that it is a strategic partnership and both the companies have been working for the last five years now, and it was taking it forward. “China Mobile has rolled out 700,000 base stations and they will complete a million by end of this year. They will be the single largest deployment of TDLT network probably in the next five-seven years than any other company. Just to give you a sense, India relies on us (Jio and Airtel) with probably 100,000 base stations by end of this year (FY2015-16). We will be just 10 per cent of the China Mobile and customer wise we just have a million but they have 100 million customers. But, I think we will see accelerations now,” he explained.
He said such tie-up would also require to launch sub-$100 smartphones to support the business, which would come in later.
Asked by BusinessLine on tying up with such foreign companies (like it did with Ericsson also) and why not include Indian (local) manufacturers, Mittlal said that it was not about that. “We as operators don't have any choice but to partner with others,” he said, adding that the company would work towards Prime Minister's ‘Make in India’ campaign in some other way.
Africa businessTalking about Africa business, which is not shaping up well, Mittal said that there had been some issues with the revenue transfer in terms of dollar and rupee and African local currencies, but 2015-16 will be a defining year for the company in Africa.
“We will be able to give better profits in the end of next financial year. We will grow in revenue, market share and EBIDTA margins as countries like Zambia and Congo are doing well,” Mittal said, adding that next year will be Airtel's fifth year in Africa so ‘it is time to move the ship and we should give it a big shot’.
The writer is in Barcelona at the invitation of Telenor