Bharti targets 100 million African subscribers by 2013

Bharti Airtel has finalized the acquisition of Zain’s African assets for a whopping $10.7 billion. According to the terms of the deal Bharti will also take over $1.7 billion of Zain dept. Telegreography reports that Bharti has become the world’s fifth largest mobile group, with full commercial wireless operations in 19 countries and over 180 million subscribers.

‘‘We are delighted at the closure of this transformational deal for India and Bharti Airtel. The transaction is the largest ever cross-border deal in an emerging market and will result in combined revenues of about USD13 billion.’, commented Bharti chairman, Sunil Mittal.
Bharti has said it plans to expand aggressively in its new regions of operation, and has set a target of 100 million subscribers in Africa by 2012-13, while it expects the region to generate revenues of USD5 billion and earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) of USD2 billion by that date.

Bharti has taken over Zain’s operations in 15 countries: Burkina Faso, Chad, Republic of Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Niger, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia. The Kuwaiti company’s subsidiaries in Morocco and Sudan were not included in the sale.