Sunday, Jun 08, 2003
Sunday, Jun 08, 2003 |
| Business | ||||
|
News:
Front Page |
National |
Southern States |
Other States |
International |
Opinion |
Business |
Sport |
Entertainment |
Miscellaneous |
Advts: Classifieds | Employment | Obituary | Business
By Our Special Correspondent
The acquisition of Telia's stake in the JV has reported to have cost Bharti Cellular around $59 million. Bharti Cellular, it may be recalled, is a wholly owned subsidiary of Bharti Tele-Ventures. With the buy-out of Telia, Bharti Mobile has now become a 100 per cent subsidiary of Bharti Cellular. Bharti Mobile has 12 lakh customers across Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Punjab. All these circles operate on GSM 900 MHz network. The present annualised revenue is over Rs. 850 crores for these mobile operations. In Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, Bharti's AirTel brand is believed to be the leader. In Punjab, Bharti launched its operations only in February last year. It is reportedly having a market share of 36 per cent in Punjab. The Bharti group, it may be mentioned, has announced that it will bring all its five mobile subsidiaries under one company, Bharti Cellular. Much earlier, it had even said that it was proposing to merge all its subsidiaries in fixed line, long distance and broadband services under one-roof, Bharti Infotel. The merger is easier said than done. Some subsidiaries at least (like Bharti Mobile and Bharti Mobinet) have some foreign equity holders. The buy-out of Telia in Bharti Mobile has gone on smoothly. Group sources say that the buy-out of Telia has cleared the decks for the merger of Bharti Mobile into Bharti Cellular. The legal processes will be set in motion soon in this regard, they say. It may be recalled that Bharti Mobinet, providing cell services in Kolkatta, had already been amalgamated with Bharti Cellular. In Bharti Mobinet (formerly Skycell), which provides services in Chennai, however, the group is still trying to convince the minority stakeholder, DSS Enterprises, to quit. DSS is reported to be holding 4.67 per cent stake in Bharti Mobinet. The group got into the erstwhile Skycell by buying out the Indian promoter, Thapar group, and upping its stake subsequently by acquiring the shares held by Luxembourg-based Millicom and Atlanta-based BellSouth International. It had since renamed Skycell as Bharti Mobinet. The consolidation process initiated by the group will see a single holding company in Bharti TeleVentures and couple of subsidiaries — Bharti Cellular and Bharti Infotel. In fact, the Bharti group has even gone in for a consolidation of its mobile service brand to cut cost, improve efficiency and beef up the reach of communication. Accordingly, it has chosen to merge AirTel Magic, the pre-paid service brand, into the umbrella brand of AirTel. It has even gone in for a re-jig of its advertising clients in the wake of brand consolidation.
Printer friendly
page
News:
Front Page |
National |
Southern States |
Other States |
International |
Opinion |
Business |
Sport |
Entertainment |
Miscellaneous |
|
|
|
The Hindu Group: Home | About Us | Copyright | Archives | Contacts | Subscription Group Sites: The Hindu | Business Line | The Sportstar | Frontline | The Hindu eBooks | Home |
Copyright © 2003, The
Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of
this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of
The Hindu
|
