Vodafone Essar, Bharti and Idea have agreed to create a shared network infrastructure in India, bringing better telecoms access for Indian consumers.

Vodafone’s newly acquired Indian mobile unit, Vodafone Essar, has joined forces with two rival GSM carriers to set up a shared network infrastructure in the country.

Vodafone Essar – a subsidiary of Vodafone Group Plc, the world’s leading international mobile communications group – Bharti Infratel Limited and Idea Cellular Limited have announced that they have agreed to form an independent tower company, Indus Towers Limited, to provide passive infrastructure services in India to all operators on a non-discriminatory basis.

The three companies will merge their existing passive infrastructure assets in 16 circles (16 service licence areas) in India. Vodafone Essar and Bharti will own around 42% each and Idea will own the remaining 16% stake.

The primary benefit will be the accelerated expansion of coverage, especially into rural areas, and enables wider access to affordable services for all, helping to meet the Indian Government’s teledensity targets.

Indus Towers will be an independently managed and operated company, offering services to all telecom operators and other wireless services providers such as broadcasters and broadband services providers; it will have approximately 70,000 sites at inception providing it with significant scale benefits.
While operators will continue to run their active infrastructure completely independently, they will be able to enjoy capital and operating expenditure savings, enhanced operational efficiency and quicker expansion of coverage.

At an investor day to discuss the Indian mobile business on Monday 9 December, Vodafone’s Chief Executive, Arun Sarin, also announced that a Vodafone-led consortium has won a licence to build a new network in Qatar, one of the world’s richest nations, seeing off competition from Verizon Communications and Etisalat.

Making its mobile licence bid in partnership with the Qatar Foundation, a non-profitmaking body founded by Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani, the country’s ruler, Vodafone has looked to increase its presence in the Middle East after ending a partnership with MTC, the Kuwait City-based mobile operator, in September.