Bt May Take Stake In Bharti Mobile

British Telecom is planning to pick up a stake in Bharti Mobile Ltd's cellular services in the Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh circle.

An executive in Bharti Enterprises_a joint venture partner with Telia in Bharti Mobile_said, "The talks are still in preliminary stages."

Bharti Mobile had paid around $90 million for a controlling stake from the Sanmar Group and Telecom Thailand in JT Mobiles. If the British company picks up a stake in the firm, the Bharti Group will be able to recover part of the Rs 400 crore investment it plans for setting up an optic fibre backbone.

At the time of the takeover, JT Mobile had accumulated losses of around Rs 600 crore. But, the entire Andhra -Karnataka circle was valued at over $300 million when Bharti Mobile took over the network.

 

In Chennai, Bharti bought a controlling stake from the Crompton Greaves-DSS combine for around Rs 150 crore.

Bharti Enterprises already has a tieup with BT in two joint ventures, both of which are partners in Bharti BT, which provides V-SAT services and offers customised solutions to the industry.

Bharti-BT Internet, another venture between the two partners, provides Net access via PSTN, ISDN and leased lines and offers e-mail, Web access, basic Web hosting and value-added services such as intranets, virtual private networks, roaming, complex Web hosting and e-commerce services.

The Cell Partners

* Bharti and BT already have two tieups, Bharti BT and Bharti-BT internet

* Bharti Mobile took controlling stake in JT Mobiles for $90 million

* Bharti Mobile launched its AirTel services in Bangalore merging JTM with AirTel

* Bharti plans to take Bharti Televentures to Nasdaq or NYSE later this year

* Bharti Telecom plans to invest around Rs 3,000 crore in three years

* Around $200 million will be raised through a public offering