Airtel announces massive network expansion plans for West Bengal

To make significant investments to rollout 10,000 new mobile sites across the state to augment its high speed network footprint

Will begin deploying Pre-5G Massive MIMO technology in Kolkata to considerably enhance high speed data experience for customers

Kolkata, July 10, 2018: Bharti Airtel (“Airtel”), India’s largest telecommunications service provider, today said that it will make significant investments to expand its high speed network footprint across West Bengal as part of its network transformation initiative - Project Leap.

During FY18-19, Airtel plans to rollout 10,000 new mobile sites across West Bengal to significantly boost network capacity for high speed data and voice services. The roll-out would translate to the addition of one new mobile site per hour to Airtel’s future-ready network in West Bengal.

Airtel will also start deploying Pre-5G Massive MIMO technology in Kolkata to offer a superior high speed data experience to customers. Massive MIMO technology, which will be deployed at major business hubs and residential locations in the city, will expand network capacity by 5-7 times over the same spectrum, and delivers superfast data speeds despite large number of concurrent users at the same location. Airtel had recently deployed the solution at Eden Gardens during the IPL 2018 and received extremely positive customer feedback.

Sameer Anjaria, Chief Executive Officer – West Bengal & Odisha, Bharti Airtel Ltd, said: “As part of our endeavor to build a future ready network to deliver best-in-class experience to our customers, we are stepping up our network investments across West Bengal. Airtel has pioneered the rollout of Massive MIMO in India and we will now undertake wide scale deployments of the cutting-edge technology in key business and residential hubs across Kolkata. This will truly add to the smartphone experience for Airtel customers.”

The planned roll-out will augment the number of mobile sites in the state of West Bengal by 35%, taking the total number of sites to 38,000. Airtel’s optic fiber footprint in the state will also get a boost with the addition of 2,000 kms of fresh fiber rollout, taking the total footprint to 17,000 kms to enable high speed data transmission.

Airtel is already witnessing a steady surge in its VoLTE traffic in Kolkata on the back of the availability of a seamless 4G network with fallback capability. With the fast growing availability of more Airtel VoLTE compatible handsets, more customers will be able to enjoy HD voice quality, faster call set up with Airtel VOLTE.

Network highlights of Airtel in West Bengal:

• • 7,200+ sites rolled out in FY17-18
• • 1,100 kms Optical fibre laid out in FY17-18
• • Airtel VoLTE services launched in Kolkata, December 2017
• • We have now reached 51,000 towns and villages across Bengal

About Bharti Airtel Limited:
Bharti Airtel Limited is a leading global telecommunications company with operations in 16 countries across Asia and Africa. Headquartered in New Delhi, India, the company ranks amongst the top 3 mobile service providers globally in terms of subscribers. In India, the company's product offerings include 2G, 3G and 4G wireless services, mobile commerce, fixed line services, high speed home broadband, DTH, enterprise services including national & international long distance services to carriers. In the rest of the geographies, it offers 2G, 3G, 4G wireless services and mobile commerce. Bharti Airtel had over 413 million customers across its operations at the end of March 2018. To know more please visit, www.airtel.in