Bharti Airtel acquires Loop Mobile, rises to the top spot in terms of subscribers

Bharti Airtel has acquired Mumbai-based Loop Mobile, marking one of the biggest acquisitions in the Indian telecom sector. The deal is speculated to be around Rs 700 crore. As a part of the deal, Airtel will get around 3.2 million Loop subscribers, its retail outlets and about 400-500 cellular towers, reports Business Standard.   Prior to the acquisition, Airtel had 4.1 million subscribers compared to Vodafone’s 6.8 million subscribers. Airtel now has around seven million subscribers, including Loop users. This means, it now becomes the leading telecom subscriber by surpassing Vodafone.   Moreover, Loop reportedly has average revenue per user (ARPU) of over Rs 225, which is higher than Bharti Airtel’s ARPU of Rs 195 as well as the industry average that is around Rs 100. It should be noted that Loop operates only in Mumbai.   Reports about a **possible Airtel-Loop deal** gathered momentum late last year in September, while both companies were believed to be in talks for long before that. Besides increase in the number of subscribers, the deal was earlier believed to be of strategic interest to Bharti who operates in the 1800MHz band. Loop operates in 8 MHz of spectrum in the 900 MHz frequency which is considered to be more efficient. It helps reducing the number of mobile phone towers and eventually the cost for Airtel. However, Airtel may not get any spectrum benefits as Loop’s 20-year licence is said to expire by the end of year and as we know the telco **didn’t participate in the auctions** held earlier this month.   Loop Mobile started its operations in 1995 as BPL Mobile. Later in 2005, it was acquired by Khaitan Holdings Group. As per July 2013, it had more than 3 million subscribers, out of which 30 percent were post paid.