'The 7 mn strong SMEs will be our major thrust area'

Airtel has crossed the million-subscriber base in broadband and telephone
services. It plans to expand its services covering 14 towns in 10 circles and
also plans to invest Rs 1500 crore by the end of the financial year 2005-06.
With this, Bharti has cumulatively invested more than Rs 3,500 crore on
broadband and telephone services. Badri Agarwal, president, Bharti Tele-Ventures
speaks to Sudesh Prasad of CyberMedia about its broadband strategy.

What is your strategy for catering to the enterprise customers?

We have a separate division called Airtel Enterprises to provide complete
solution to the large enterprises. Our portfolio consists the entire gamut of
services including mobile, fixed line, and data and Internet solutions.

Any specific plan for the SME segment?

We recently conducted a survey of SMEs in India and found that there are 38
categories of SMEs in India and they number around 7 mn. We have created a
separate SME division with a CEO as its head to focus on the needs of this
important segment. I think that as the IT professionals at SME-end are not
completely competent to chalk out strategies for their companies, we will have
to do a lot of hand-holding with these customers.

You are present only in large cities. Is there any plan to move beyond the
existing cities?

We are expanding services to 14 towns and adding 66 towns in 14 circles. The
new towns include Mumbai, Chandigarh, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Cochin, Kolkata,
Lucknow, Ghaziabad, Pune, Agra, Meerut, Ludhiana, Jaipur, and Jalandhar.

What is your target for the fixed line services?

We are going to target the enterprise in large cities and high-income and
middle-income areas for domestic users.

Will AirTel take the fixed wireless route to reach customers?

No. We believe that fixed wireless phone is not a great product as it data
capabilities are not mature. Now that ADC has been imposed on FWP by DoT, it no
longer remains a viable option. We will continue to reach out residential
customers through DSL as that gives more value and data speed as high as 50
mbps.