Essar arm gets Rs 450 cr investment from PAIDF

Ruias-led Essar Telecom today said one of its subsidiaries in Kenya has received an investment of Rs 450 crore ($93.75 million) from the Pan-African Infrastructure Development Fund (PAIDF) to expand its footprint in East Africa.     

Essar Telecom Kenya Holdings (ETKHL), a subsidiary of the Essar Telecom, has received the investment from the infrastructure equity fund to expand the East African operations of Essar, the telco said in a statement.     

ETKHL had recently acquired a controlling interest in Econet Wireless Kenya and subsequently renamed the company as Essar Telecom Kenya (ETKL).     

ETKL has a GSM telephony licence in Kenya under the brand "yu". It launched its services in October 2008 as Kenya’s fourth mobile telecommunications operator and already has about 400,000 subscribers on its network in Nairobi and Mombasa.     

The company expects this number to grow significantly as it completes its roll-out across Kenya by the year-end, the statement added.     

Srinivasa Iyengar, CEO, ETKL, said: "We are delighted to have PAIDF, Africa’s largest infrastructure equity fund, as an investor in our business. This also signifies the immense value that ETKL has managed to build in a short span of time. We are committed to building a quality network in Kenya." 

Tshepo Mahloele, CEO, Harith, Fund Managers for PAIDF said that the Fund is excited about the telecom opportunity and its partnership with the Essar Group.    

"We are certain that the Essar Group will bring about a landscape change to the mobile telecom market in the East African region that will extend beyond Kenya.     

"The partnership between the Fund and Essar Group is in line with our strategy of partnering with companies and individuals looking to expand on infrastructure investment opportunities on the African continent," he said.     

Essar, one of the initial entrants in telecom business in India, is today a global player in the communications sector with a comprehensive set of offerings across the spectrum of the communications business — in telecom services, telecom tower infrastructure, telecom retail and IT/telecom enabled services.