Bharti, Nokia partner for ‘MEGA’ networks

India’s leading telecom conglomerate Bharti Tele-Ventures has partnered with Nokia, one of the key market leaders in the cellular service industry in the Asia-Pacific region, to build and manage ‘MEGA’ networks. The scope extends to Airtel’s existing circles of Mumbai, Maharashtra (including Goa) and Gujarat and the two new circles of Bihar (including Jharkhand) and Orissa. With such an agreement in place, the service quality and delivery level across all the five Airtel networks is set to take a major leap forward.

The announcement came at a press conference that was held in Mumbai. As a part of this initiative, Nokia will supply, manage, maintain and provide quality assurance in three existing and two new Airtel networks. The value for the three-year period for supply and services is projected at approximately $275 million. The agreement is on the basis of capacity on demand and pay as you grow. The initiative is aimed at congestion-free networks with seamless coverage and enhanced quality in over 550 towns and cities across five circles. EDGE deployment is also being planned to provide higher data transfer rates to deliver the full potential of advanced mobile Internet services, streaming videos and Internet-based multimedia services.

Says Manoj Kohli, President-Mobility, Bharti Tele-Ventures Ltd, “In the last three years, there has been fantastic growth in the telecom sector. Penetration of mobile phones has overtaken fixed connections, and has managed to delve deep into the Sec C and D category. A milestone for the telecom industry in India is that Indian tariffs are the lowest compared to any other place on the globe. We already exist in sixteen circles, with Rajasthan being the latest edition, and are planning to broach into seven more circles in the next six months. These include Jammu and Kashmir, Assam, Bihar and Orissa.”

Moving on to the partnership with Nokia, Kohli asserts, “Our agreement with Nokia is a major step forward in aligning the interest of the operator and the vendor partner. This shall enable us to have world class state-of-the-art network, wider coverage and significantly improved quality of service on one hand, while giving us economies of scale and improved cash flows on the other.”

Meanwhile, Ashish Chowdhary, Country Head, India & South Asia Networks, states, “We are proud to collaborate with Bharti, which is India’s leading operator on this significant network expansion exercise. We feel that this deployment will enable Bharti to offer world class network quality and services to its end consumers. This deal underscores Nokia’s commitment to India, fulfilling our promise to bring high quality equipment and services to India’s mobile world. We congratulate Bharti on its innovative approach in addressing audiences.”

As per the agreement, Nokia will continuously deliver equipment and services based on Bharti’s capacity requirements, improving efficiency by eliminating overlap and duplication of roles between the two companies as well as cost efficient rollout and provision on demand capacity. The agreement also provisions for taking over of close to 100 Bharti employees by Nokia.