Fifth Mobile Network to Launch in Sri Lanka

India's Bharti Airtel has announced that it will launch its new network in Sri Lanka on January 12th - offering both 3G and GSM services. The company has earmarked some US$200 million for its network rollout in the country.

The network had been expected to launch last month though - following a lengthy dispute over interconnection with the incumbent operators.

Airtel outsourced the IT operations of the new network to IBM while Huawei is rolling out the network infrastructure. Bharti Telesoft, a division of the Bharti group, will offer value added services.

A recent report from Fitch Ratings warned though that the weak macroeconomic environment in Sri Lanka with sustained high inflation has set a more challenging stage for the telecom operators - operating costs are increasing, and the operators are witnessing lower usage levels and experiencing more difficulties penetrating in to the lower income segments.

Figures from the Mobile World subscriber database estimates that the country ended last September with just over 9.8 million subscribers - representing a population penetration level of 47%.

Posted to the site on 5th January 2009