Indian telco Bharti Airtel isn't simply a major player in international telecom—it's now the world’s second largest international telco group in terms of mobile subscriptions, behind undisputed top dog China Mobile.
Launching its first domestic mobile services in India in 1995, Bharti Airtel has built up a portfolio of businesses covering 17 countries in Asia and Africa. Here's a look at how Bharti Airtel grew to an international telecom behemoth, powered by data you can find in TeleGeography’s GlobalComms Database.
A current snapshot of Bharti Airtel
At the end of 2025, the Airtel group had 601.1 million mobile subscriptions across its 15 consolidated operations, plus a further 76.7 million via joint ventures in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, to give it a total of 677.8 million mobile subscriptions group-wide (note that figures reported by Airtel and those used in GlobalComms Database don’t always match due to varying accounting methods used by the parent group, its local subsidiaries and national regulators).
Bharti Airtel recorded consolidated total revenue of INR1.75 trillion ($20 billion) in the year to end-March 2025, an increase from INR1.50 trillion a year earlier. EBITDA improved from INR790.5 billion to INR984.2 billion over the same period, whilst net income reached INR335.3 billion, compared to INR74.5 billion in the year to March 31, 2024.
Bharti Airtel’s two main shareholders are Singtel of Singapore, with a stake of around 27.5% at end-2025, and Bharti Enterprises, with a direct and indirect holding of approximately 21.4%.
Bharti Enterprises was founded in 1976 by its current chairman Sunil Bharti Mittal. It is a major Indian conglomerate, with business interests spanning industries including telecoms, technology, insurance, real estate and hospitality.
Domestic business
Bharti Enterprises established a presence in India’s telecoms markets in the mid-1990s through a series of subsidiaries and joint ventures – including tie-ups with BT, Telecom Italia and SFR – starting with Bharti Cellular, which was awarded a GSM license in 1992 and launched in Delhi three years later.
Over the following decade it solidified its position by purchasing additional licenses and through several acquisitions, in the process firming up its ‘Airtel’ brand identity.
In March 2006, nationwide GSM operator Bharti Cellular and regional licensees Bharti Mobile, Bharti Mobitel, Bharti Mobinet, Bharti Telenet and Hexacom were merged into Bharti Airtel.
Airtel now provides retail mobile voice and data, fixed broadband and voice, and pay-TV services throughout India, as well as a range of corporate and business-oriented connectivity and ICT solutions.
Airtel India had 396.4 million mobile, 13.1 million fixed broadband and 10.1 million fixed voice subscriptions at the end of 2025. It sits in second place in all these markets, behind its main domestic competitor, Reliance Jio.
Asian joint ventures
The group went on to expand to Sri Lanka and Bangladesh in the 2000s, and both these businesses are now operated in partnership with Axiata of Malaysia.
Airtel acquired a 70% stake in Warid Telecom in Bangladesh in 2010 for $300 million, rebranding it as Airtel Bangladesh in December that year. Airtel took 100% control in 2013. In 2016, the operator was merged into Robi Axiata, and Airtel now has a 28.2% stake in the enlarged business, with Axiata holding the remainder.
Its Sri Lankan division, meanwhile, was established in 2007 when the group paid $4 million for a combined 2G/3G license. Its commercial launch took place in January 2009. Airtel Lanka merged with another Axiata subsidiary, Dialog, in June 2024 through a deal that granted Airtel a 10.4% stake in the enlarged company. Dialog Axiata controls around 66% of Sri Lanka’s mobile market.
Airtel Africa
Airtel acquired a swathe of new units in 2010 when it took over the mobile operations of Zain Group in 15 African countries for a total of $10.7 billion. The footprint has changed slightly since then, with two more markets added (Seychelles and Rwanda) and exits from three countries (Burkina Faso, Ghana and Sierra Leone).
Airtel's Operations
| Country | Operator | Mobile subs | Effective ownership |
| (Dec 2025) | (direct and indirect) | ||
| India | Bharti Airtel | 396,431,970 | 100.0% |
| Nigeria | Airtel Nigeria | 60,893,280 | 56.1% |
| Bangladesh | Robi Axiata | 57,400,000 | 28.2% |
| Kenya | Airtel Kenya | 24,500,000 | 56.1% |
| Tanzania | Airtel Tanzania | 22,945,425 | 28.6% |
| Congo, Dem. Rep. | Airtel DRC | 22,000,000 | 55.3% |
| Sri Lanka | Dialog Axiata | 19,332,000 | 10.4% |
| Uganda | Airtel Uganda | 19,200,000 | 50.0% |
| Zambia | Airtel Zambia | 12,650,000 | 50.5% |
| Madagascar | Airtel Madagascar | 9,034,200 | 56.1% |
| Malawi | Airtel Malawi | 8,625,000 | 44.9% |
| Niger | Airtel Niger | 8,500,000 | 50.5% |
| Chad | Airtel Chad | 7,875,000 | 56.1% |
| Rwanda | Airtel Rwanda | 4,700,000 | 56.1% |
| Congo, Rep. | Airtel Congo | 2,035,000 | 50.5% |
| Gabon | Airtel Gabon | 1,622,336 | 56.1% |
| Seychelles | Airtel Seychelles | 86,223 | 56.1% |
The African operations are managed by holding company Airtel Africa, which is 62.4% owned by Bharti Airtel.
The group comprises Airtel’s mobile divisions in 14 countries, divided into three groupings:
- Nigeria
- East Africa: Uganda, Zambia, Tanzania, Kenya, Malawi and Rwanda
- Francophone Africa: Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Gabon, the Republic of Congo, Madagascar, Niger, Chad and Seychelles.
In December 2025, Airtel Africa signed an agreement with US-based SpaceX to introduce direct-to-cell (D2C) services provided by the latter’s Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite firm Starlink across all 14 of its markets. The D2C service is set to be made available in 2026, initially limited to text messaging and data for selected applications.
Airtel Africa served a combined total of 204.7 million subscriptions across its 14 markets at the end of 2025, up from 184.3 million at December 31, 2024. The biggest single operation is Airtel Nigeria, with 60.9 million subscriptions at end-2025.
In its most recent full-year financials, for the year to end-March 2025, Airtel Africa recorded a net profit attributable to shareholders of $220 million, reversing a net loss of $165 million the previous year. The group has been negatively impacted by severe currency devaluations in Nigeria, Malawi and Zambia. In reported currency, total revenue for FY 2024/25 decreased by 0.5% to $4.96 billion, whilst in constant currency the company reported a 21.1% uptick. Similarly, underlying EBITDA totalled $2.30 billion in 2024/25, representing a 5.1% year-on-year decrease in reported currency but growth of 18.1% in constant currency.
Data on mobile markets, fixed broadband, fixed voice markets, and more
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