Bharti Airtel Confirms Plans to Sell Tower Business

India's Bharti Airtel says that it has prepared a roadmap which would allow the company to divest a majority stake in its tower arm Bharti Infratel in the future. Bharti Airtel chairman Sunil Mittal told local newspaper, The Economic Times that the company has no timeframe for the sale of the tower business, but that the aim is to convert the company into an independent entity which could share its infrastructure on a non-partial basis with all operators.

"We should not have a tower company. We should only have some stake in Infratel, but it should be independently run. Eventually, we are looking at divesting a majority stake.

The roadmap is as follows: After the completion of the demerger, we will enter into comprehensive sharing agreements with other service providers. Bharti in time will divest a majority stake and may also go for an IPO, thus making Infratel a completely independent company," Mr Mittal added.

There had been reports recently that the company was considering merging its tower business with that of Vodafone and Idea, but this does not seem to be on the table anymore.

On the web: The Economic Times

Posted to the site on 11th October 2007