CCI approves Google’s $700 million investment in Bharti Airtel

Earlier this year, Bharti Airtel, the second-largest telecom operator in the country announced that it is getting a $1 billion investment from Google.

On June 30, 2022, Airtel said that it has received a green light from CCI for the Google investment of $700 million.

Google has executed an Investment Agreement (IA) with Bharti Airtel, under which it will acquire a minority and non-controlling stake of 1.28 per cent equity share capital in the Indian company. Along with the IA, Google and Bharti Airtel through their affiliates have also entered into certain commercial deals. The parties also intend to enter into certain other commercial arrangements in the future.

The CCI approved the proposed combination on the basis of modifications offered by Google.

Google and Airtel are looking to form multiple commercial agreements in the future which will be different than what Jio plans to do with the search-engine giant.

Google is also working closely with Reliance Jio, India’s number one telecom operator and the primary competition of Bharti Airtel. This, the companies claim, will have no conflict of interest with the present combination.

Gopal Vittal, CEO of Bharti Airtel had said earlier that there will be no conflict of interest in the telco’s deal with Google. Vittal had clarified that the deal between Airtel and Google is a different one than what exists between Google and Jio.

Google and Airtel are looking to form multiple commercial agreements in the future which will be different from what Jio plans to do with the search-engine giant. 

Airtel has also announced deferment of additional AGR (adjusted gross revenue) dues of up to FY2018-19 for four years, which will help the company save thousands of crores that will put Airtel in a very strong position to go head-to-head against Jio.

Google International LLC is a wholly owned subsidiary of Google LLC. Google LLC is a Delaware limited liability company and wholly owned subsidiary of Alphabet Inc. The Acquirer is a holding company and does not own / operate any of Google’s products/ services. Google, however, offers various products and services, including its flagship search service, its Android operating system, and its Play app store.

Bharti Airtel Limited, headquartered in India, is an international communications solutions provider with over 480 million customers in 17 countries across South Asia and Africa. BAL’s retail portfolio includes, amongst others, high speed mobile broadband, Airtel Xstream Fiber, streaming services (music and video), digital payments and financial services. For enterprise customers, BAL offers solutions including secure connectivity, cloud and data centre services, cyber security, IoT, advertising services, and cloud-based communication.