Airtel buys Videocon's airwaves in six circles for Rs 4,428 crore

NEW DELHI: Bharti Airtel has completed the acquisition of Videocon's airwaves in six circles for Rs 4,428 crore, adding to its 4G spectrum holding as the country's No. 1telecom operator gears up for a battle over data services with Reliance Jio Infocomm.

“All necessary approvals, including the conditions stated in the Spectrum Trading Guidelines, have been met with,” the two companies said in a joint statement on Tuesday. In mid-March, the two companies said they had entered into a deal to trade airwaves in the 1800 MHz band across six circles of Bihar, Gujarat, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, UP (East) and UP (West) for Rs 4,428 crore. Airtel acquired 2X5 MHz of airwaves in the 1800 MHz band, which is the most popular globally for deploying 4G high speed broadband services.

The announcement to trade airwaves had come a day after Idea Cellular, Bharti Airtel rival's, had terminated its spectrum trading agreement with Videocon Telecom for the latter's Gujarat and UP West circles, signed for Rs 3,310 crore. The airwaves that Bharti Airtel is buying from Videocon are valid till December 18, 2032. In all those circles, barring MP, Bharti has airwaves in the same band which were not auctioned and are being used for 2G. Hence, the carrier would have been able to use them for 4G only upon paying a market-linked price.