| Corporate | | | Bharti Airtel signs pact with Ericsson for Africa operations | | | TT Correspondent | | 22 Jul 2011 | | |   Telecom giant Bharti Airtel on Thursday has signed a five-year managed services agreement with Ericsson for its Africa operations .
"As per the agreement, Ericsson will manage and optimize Airtel's mobile networks in Africa in order to provide a superior customer experience," the company said in a statement.
Ericsson's first multi-country managed services deal in Africa will enable Airtel to focus on its core operations of innovating and launching new products, services and mobile applications for over 44 million customers across the continent.
"Ericsson has been our managed services and network technology partner in the Asian operations. Given its expertise and strong track record, we are confident that this partnership will be able to efficiently deliver the best networks and services to our customers in Africa," said Manoj Kohli, chief executive officer (International) and joint managing director of Bharti Airtel.
"The new generation equipment from Ericsson will help reduce our total cost of ownership of the networks," he added.
The company also signed a two-year agreement with Ericsson under which it will modernise and upgrade Airtel's mobile networks in Africa with the latest technology, including its multi standard RBS 6000 base station.
As part of the modernisation, Ericsson will also provide technology consulting, network planning and design and network deployment, the statement added.
Bharti Airtel has operations in 19 countries across Asia and Africa. |
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