Airtel integrates carrier, enterprise units under new CEO

Bharti Airtel has integrated its enterprise and carrier businesses and appointed Ajay Chitkara, the current CEO of Global Business, to head the combined operation. Airtel said the integration of the global business with its enterprise unit will help it “leverage its global reach and deep relationships” for the benefit of its enterprise customers. “Under Ajay’s […]

Reliance Jio to buy $1 bln worth of goods from Samsung, Ace Tech

Reliance Jio Infocomm, the telecom subsidiary of Reliance Industries, said it will take a loan of $1 bln from Korea Trade Insurance Corporation to purchase goods from Korean companies Samsung and Ace Technologies. “The Facility is K-SURE’s largest deal in India as well as the largest deal supported by K-SURE in the telecom sector globally,” […]

Airtel issues letter on Muslim employee controversy

Bharti Airtel has issued a letter on social media explaining its side of the controversy that broke out after an employee with an Arabic name was rejected by a customer on the basis of his possible affiliation to Islam, and the request was subsequently handled by someone with a Sikh name. Explaining the incident, the […]

BSNL could launch 5G within one year

Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd could end up launching 5G services as early as the first half of 2019, going by comments made by a senior official at an industry forum today. Speaking at the Mobile Device Summit 2018 organized by ‘The Mobile Association’, Anil Jain, the company’s Chief General Manager in charge of New Generation Networks promised […]

TCS opens new DC in Paris as Macron tries to entice more investment

Tata Consultancy Services said it opened its third delivery center in France, with a capacity to seat up to 230 employees. The new DC is being opened at Suresnes near Paris. The company, which opened its first delivery center in 2012 and a second one two years later, did not specify how many employees would work […]

India meets solar mission target for FY18 thanks to year-end push

India is likely to have met its target of adding 10,000 watt of solar power generation capacity in the year ended March 2018, thanks to a sudden spurt of installations during the final months of the year (Jan-Mar), going by numbers released by an independent group. According to Mercom India, a consultancy that tracks the […]

TCS doubles M&G Prudential deal to £1 bln

Tata Consultancy Services announced a major expansion of its recently announced deal to take over administration of around 4 mln life and pensions contracts from M&G Prudential, the  savings and investments business of Prudential. The deal, announced in January this year, was worth pegged at £500 mln (half a billion pounds) at the time. Today, the company reported […]

ALTBalaji adding 25,000-30,000 paid users per day – CEO

ALTBalaji, the biggest Indian provider of original online content, is signing up paid users at the rate of 25,000-30,000 per day, said Nachiket Pantvaidya, the CEO of Balaji Telefilms, the company behind the app. “We expect to have paid users of 10 mln by the end of the year,” Pantvaidya said in an interview with BTVI. […]

Bharti Airtel’s 4G capacity to see massive increase this year in Mumbai

Bharti Airtel has announced a massive expansion program for its Mumbai 4G network that could increase the data carrying capacity by several times in one year. The expansion comprises four areas — increasing the number of cell sites by about 30%, increasing the 4G spectrum by about 25%, expanding fiber capacity by about 18% and […]

HT Media to invest Rs 400 cr in Fever 104 FM

HT Media, the company that publishes the Hindustan Times newspaper, said it obtained approval from its board of directors to invest another Rs 400 cr into its FM business. The company operates ‘Fever 104’ FM stations in over a dozen cities in India. However, it is dwarfed by competitors like Radio Mirchi from the Times […]

Infosys CEO Salil Parekh dismisses growth concerns

Infosys CEO Salil Parekh reassured investors that the IT services behemoth was not facing a growth crisis because of the replacement of traditional sourcing models with digital services. He said new age services — such as analytics, marketing, digital product design, digital system integration, cloud migration and cyber security were already at a huge size, […]

Ahead of Reliance Jio Fiber launch, Spectra offers unlimited 1 Gbps at Rs 1,249

Spectra, formerly known as Spectranet, said it is now offering what is arguably India’s cheapest high-speed broadband service, even as rumors of an impending launch of Reliance Jio’s JioFiber start gaining momentum. Under the plan, Spectra said customers will get a download and upload speed of 1 Gbps (1,000 Mbps) with unlimited data usage for […]

Porn on Phone? You could go to prison for 3 years

People carrying pornographic or other indecent material on their phones can end up getting prison terms of up to three years under a new law proposed by the ministry of women and child development headed by Maneka Gandhi. Under the ‘Indecent Representation of Women Act’, anyone possessing printed content, drawings and films “which contains indecent […]

Idea Cellular completes sale of 9,900 towers to ATC for Rs 4,000 cr

Idea Cellular said its had completed the sale of its 9,900 towers to American Tower Corp’s India unit at an ‘enterprise valuation’ of Rs 4,000 cr. The exact amount that ATC will pay to the telecom operator for the towers is not clear. Enterprise valuation includes the money payable to creditors as well as shareholders. […]

BJP, Congress score self-goals in Kerala Chengannur bye-election

Both the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress Party in Kerala have reason to worry from the results of Chengannur bye-election conducted on Sunday. With nearly all votes in — including those from areas considered strongholds of Congress and BJP — the Left Front candidate Saji Cherian was comfortably in the lead. The vote share […]

Rahul Gandhi says will work other parties to save Indian democracy

Boosted by the first big victory since in several years, Congress Party president Rahul Gandhi said his party will join hands with the opposition to “protect Indian institutions” from the attacks of the Bharatiya Janata Party and Rashtreeya Swayamsevak Sangh. Speaking in the aftermath of the BJP failing to win majority in Karnataka Assembly, Gandhi […]