Bharti Airtel is taking bold steps in making sure they are the best pan-India operator for providing high-speed mobile data services by acquiring 8 telecom circles from Aircel’s 4G spectrum. This is the second deal in less than a month after the deal with Videocon Telecommunication for buying six regions from them for Rs. 4,428 crore.
Bharti Airtel has entered into an agreement with Aircel and its subsidiaries like Dishnet Wireless and Aircel cellular to acquire rights to use 20 megahertz (MHz) in 2300 band 4G TD spectrum across eight circles. The validity of the Spectrum held by Aircel and Dishnet is valid up to September 20, 2030 and it includes the following circles – Tamil Nadu (Chennai), Bihar, West Bengal, Assam, Orissa, North East, Andhra Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir.
The regions covered in the Videocon deal include Bihar, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh East and West as well as Gujarat. The validity of the spectrum held by Videocon is extending till 2032.
Bharti Airtel, commenting on the launch, said, “The transfer of the right to use for the circles of Andhra Pradesh and Orissa is subject to the revision of spectrum caps with the upcoming auction to be conducted by department of telecommunication.” With all the hype being created around the much awaited launch of Reliance Jio all other telecom operators are gearing up to take them on.
Reliance Communications led by Anil Ambani and Jio signed a spectrum sharing and trading pact in January for 17 wireless areas in 800 megahertz band. Airtel is very active in acquiring many circles across India to improve its service and network coverage as a pan India 4G operator.
