Google invests $1 Billion in Bharti Airtel to boost India Push

Alphabet Inc., which owns the Google search engine, will pay $700 million for a 1.28% stake in Bharti Airtel Ltd

The remaining $300 million will go towards implementing certain commercial partnerships that will include devices

Bharti’s shares surged as much as 6.6% after the announcement that involves Google buying the carrier’s equity at 734 rupees per share

The funds will also help Bharti, which had 355.3 million users in India as of November, gear up to buy the expensive 5G airwaves

source : Bloomberg

The India carrier in July tied up with Intel Corp. to prepare its networks for 5G and is partnering with Indian conglomerate Tata Group to develop an indigenous 5G technology

It is worth noting that Google has also partnered with Airtel’s rival, Reliance Jio, for the JioPhone Next, an ultra low-cost 4G smartphone

Sunil Bharti Mittal, chairman of Bharti Airtel said " we look forward to working closely with Google to increase the depth and breadth of India’s digital ecosystem"