Bharti Airtel signs US$ 150 million deal with Huawei

Bharti Airtel, the latest mobile operator to enter Sri Lanka, will roll out their operations early next year, according to a top official in the company.

Sanjay Nandrajog, Executive Director, International Operations and Managed Services, Bharti Airtel said that they will roll out their services in the country by the first quarter of next year.

He said the company will clearly concentrate in GSM telephony services as opposed to some of their competitors. “Mobile penetration in Sri Lanka is currently at 30 percent and it is growing by about two million subscribers a year. So we see tremendous growth potential for GSM services,” he told The Sunday Times FT.

The company recently signed a managed networks deal for its Sri Lanka operations with Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. (“Huawei”), a leader in providing next generation telecommunications network solutions for operators around the world. Nandrajog said the three-year deal is valued at approximately US$ 150 million and includes telecom applications and software, adding that the latest custom-built technology from Huawei is expected to reduce Bharti Airtel’s total cost of ownership (TCO), as well as enhance its competitive edge. Specifically, Hawaii’s Distributed Node B will enable Bharti to deploy the network faster and more cost-effectively.

Under the agreement, Huawei will deploy and manage Airtel’s core network, Node-Bs and BTSs and comprehensive end-to-end 2G/3G network solutions.