Bharti, SoftBank form mobile internet JV

Bharti Enterprises today announced a joint venture with Japan’s internet company SoftBank to focus on mobile internet services in India.

The equal venture, Bharti SoftBank Holdings (BSB), will focus on three areas in India’s fast-growing mobile internet ecosystem: social media, gaming and e-commerce. The financial details of the venture were not disclosed.

With the saturation in the voice telephony, telecom companies are increasingly focusing on data services to increase usage and boost revenues. Third generation (3G) services have already been launched by all major telecom players, including Bharti Airtel.

SUNIL MITTAL’S SON JOINS BUSINESS
Meanwhile, Kavin Bharti Mittal, one of the twin sons of Bharti Enterprises Chairman Sunil Bharti Mittal, joined the family business at the age of 25. He will head strategy & new product development at BSB.

Last year, Shravin Bharti Mittal, the other son of Sunil Bharti Mittal, was appointed as a manager with Bharti Airtel International (Netherlands) BV, the investment company through which Bharti bought African telecom firm Zain.

Kavin has been involved in the start-up community and is an extreme tech enthusiast. At the age of 20, Kavin founded and led a start-up, AppSpark, with a team of six to build and explore the possibilities in the mobile application space. In 2009, AppSpark launched iPhone/iPad application ‘Movies Now’ in partnership with movietickets.com. In 2010, AppSpark’s focus was to build foodster, a whole new take on food recommendations, which was launched in the Beta version in June 2011.

He is a Masters in Electrical and Electronics Engineering and Management from Imperial College, London.