Africa has greater potential than India or China: Airtel

Bharti is betting big on the African market as during a conference call  to provide an update on the Zain acquisition, Bharti said that the current teledensity in Africa stands at only 20 per cent, while population coverage is 60 per cent. With the population of Africa expected to rise to 1.8 to 2 billion from 1 billion right now, according to Bharti, and with urbanisation already at 40 per cent, the potential of the African market is greater than that of India and China.
Also, Africa currently has a middle class of 400 million and a median age of 17 to 18 years, which implies that it is ripe for telecom services to grow, provided tariffs become affordable and network coverage proves adequate.

 “Bharti see a huge opportunity in African market and that their growth in African will be driven by low teledensity (20 per cent in most geographies, low minutes of usage, which is around 40 to 50 minutes at present, and three data usage as broadband penetration is very low,”  says a  report  released by Religare based on conference call.
The report further said that as per the Bharti Airtel management, regulators in Africa are not looking to further increase competition in the market (currently three to four players in most markets), owing to a scarcity of spectrum (on average 2G players have 20MHz spectrum, while 3G players have 10MHz). This also means that Bharti will not face the kind of competition it is facing in its home market.
Airtel enjoys a market leading position in at least six of the 15 it is serving after the Zain acquisition. It commands more than 50 per cent market share in five countries.
Bharti has taken operational control in Africa and will launch its brand in 15 countries this October.