Bharti Airtel promises $600M investment, rural focus in Nigeria’s mobile phone market

Nigeria: Bharti promises $600M telecom investment

LAGOS, Nigeria — Bharti Airtel’s CEO says the Indian company will invest $600 million in Nigeria’s mobile phone market.

Manoj Kohli told journalists Tuesday that the world’s fifth largest telecommunications company also would expand service into the West African’s nation rural pasturelands.

Bharti, already India’s largest mobile phone company with 125 million domestic subscribers, has been trying to rapidly transform itself into an emerging market powerhouse. Bharti paid $10.7 billion to take over Kuwaiti company Zain’s holdings in Burkina Faso, Chad, the Republic of Congo, Congo, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Madagascar, Niger, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia.