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Airtel Targets 18 Percent Growth in Nigeria(AllAfrica Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Bharti Airtel Limited, India's largest mobile-phone operator, is targeting an 18 per cent jump in its Nigerian customer base over the final nine months in 2014, after regulator pressure hampered growth early in the year. Airtel, as it is popularly known, plans to increase subscribers in Africa's biggest economy to 30 million by the end of the year, Segun Ogunsanya, the head of the Nigeria unit, said in an interview with Bloomberg in Lagos. New Delhi-based Airtel had 25.5 million subscribers in Nigeria at the end of March, according to the Nigerian Communications Commission. Nigeria is the company's biggest market outside India. "I'm very optimistic that there are no encumbrances against growth so I'm sure we're going to reach the 30-million mark," said Ogunsanya, adding that "despite the environment and the issues we face, I think we're still giving relatively good service to our customers." Airtel unseated Nigeria's Globacom Limited as the second-largest operator in the country during the three months through March, behind Johannesburg-based MTN Group Limited, according to the NCC. All three companies were fined by the regulator for not meeting quality service standards in January and banned from selling new SIM cards during March. Nigeria, Africa's most populous country with about 170 million people, is a target for mobile-phone companies even as power outages and frequent bomb attacks present challenges to doing business. The total number of connected lines increased to 177 million as of the end of April, compared with 170 million at the start of the year, according to NCC data. "We're very bullish about Nigeria," said Ogunsanya, whose firm plans to spend about $300 million expanding Airtel's network and services in the country this year. "We have invested so much in marketing research to see what the customers want and we are delivering on those expectations." Bharti Airtel Limited is a leading global telecommunications company with operations in 20 countries across Asia and Africa. With headquarters in New Delhi, India, the company ranks amongst the top five mobile service providers globally in terms of subscribers. In India, the company's product offerings include 2G, 3G and 4G services, in fixed line, high speed broadband through DSL, IPTV, DTH, enterprise services including national & international long distance services to carriers. In the rest of the geographies, it offers 2G, 3G mobile services. Bharti Airtel had over 264 million customers across its operations at the end of July 2012 Copyright This Day. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). |