Bharti Airtel acquires stake in Augere Wireless, gains 4G spectrum in MP

Telecom major Bharti Airtel said that it has acquired 74% stake in Augere Wireless, which holds 4G spectrum in Madhya Pradesh, but did not disclose financial details of the deal. “With reference to the intimation regarding approval of scheme of amalgamation of Augere Wireless Broadband India Private Limited (Augere) with Bharti Airtel Limited (Airtel or the Company) dated October 27, 2015, Bharti Airtel Ltd has now informed BSE that Airtel has acquired 74% capital of Augere,” Airtel said in a regulatory filing. Augere holds 20MHz of spectrum in 2,300MHz band in Madhya Pradesh service area, which includes Chhattisgarh state, to be used for 4G services. The company had won this spectrum for Rs 124.66 crore in 2010 but has not rolled out services. “With the aforesaid acquisition, Augere has become a subsidiary of Airtel,” the filing said. On August 26, Airtel said that “it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire 100 per cent equity stake in Augere Wireless Broadband India Pvt Ltd.” According to sources, the deal size is estimated to be around Rs 150 crore. Airtel now has 20MHz in 2,300MHz band across nine service areas. The company has directly won this spectrum in four service area for Rs 3,314.36 crore. Later, it acquired Qualcomm’s India unit which had spectrum in four circles including metros. Infotel Broadband, which was acquired by Reliance Industries, was the only bidder to win spectrum on pan-India basis in the 2,300MHz band in that auction. PTI