Bharti Airtel Completes $10.7 Billion Zain Deal

Bharti is now among the five largest mobile operators in the world.

Bharti Airtel has completed the largest ever cross-border deal in emerging markets by completing its $10.7 billion acquisition of African operations from Kuwait's Zain. With this acquisition, Bharti has become a major Indian MNC with operations in 18 countries across Asia and Africa with a customer base of over 180 million. The transaction will result in combined revenues of over $12.4 billion and EBITDA of over $4.7 billion, based on the last audited results. Bharti is now among the five largest mobile operators in the world. Bharti’s acquisition of Zain’s African mobile services operations covers 15 countries with a total customer base of over 42 million. The total population base covered is over 450 million with telecom penetration of approximately 32 per cent.