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Context is everything.
Detailed stories on technology startups, business and economic current affairs.
Detailed stories on technology startups, business and economic current affairs.
After a decade as a mobile wallet and then a payments bank, the telco’s banking business has little to show for. Sunil Mittal is undeterred.
Editor's note: Chances are that you’ve forgotten that Airtel has a payments bank. We did too, believing that the company has been outdone and outplayed in the deluge of players who’ve entered in the last decade. But if you listen to Airtel’s top brass, they’d tell you that they are far from done. They go a step further, and say that they have come upon a new strategy entirely, one which will offer them success. Airtel chairman Sunil Mittal has spent a decade and around $500 million trying to marry telecoms and banking. His business aims to break even this year but fintech competitors have stolen a march in bringing finance to mobile phones. Will he be satisfied tagging along? When the company launched Airtel Money in 2010 as India’s first mobile wallet, fintech wasn’t even a popular word. But it did seem like the logical next step for Mittal, who had built India’s then biggest mobile telephony business from scratch. Inspired by the success of mobile-linked wallet services in Africa, where Airtel had business interests, it looked like Mittal had hit …
After a decade as a mobile wallet and then a payments bank, the telco’s banking business has little to show for. Sunil Mittal is undeterred.
Editor's note: Chances are that you’ve forgotten that Airtel has a payments bank. We did too, believing that the company has been outdone and outplayed in the deluge of players who’ve entered in the last decade. But if you listen to Airtel’s top brass, they’d tell you that they are far from done. They go a step further, and say that they have come upon a new strategy entirely, one which will offer them success. Airtel chairman Sunil Mittal has spent a decade and around $500 million trying to marry telecoms and banking. His business aims to break even this year but fintech competitors have stolen a march in bringing finance to mobile phones. Will he be satisfied tagging along? When the company launched Airtel Money in 2010 as India’s first mobile wallet, fintech wasn’t even a popular word. But it did seem like the logical next step for Mittal, who had built India’s then biggest mobile telephony business from scratch. Inspired by the success of mobile-linked wallet services in Africa, where Airtel had business interests, it looked like Mittal had hit …
Instead of going after scale like Jio, the Sunil Bharti Mittal-led telecom giant is chasing a smaller but higher-quality customer base to grow its home broadband segment. Will the bet pay off?
While the Rs 9,000 crore promoter investment in Q1 brings a measure of reassurance, investors will still have to wait for Jio and retail to work through their challenges.
FY26 numbers show that Airtel is stealing a march on its larger rival on most counts and is unrelenting in its ambition, casting a cloud on Jio’s valuation.
Instead of going after scale like Jio, the Sunil Bharti Mittal-led telecom giant is chasing a smaller but higher-quality customer base to grow its home broadband segment. Will the bet pay off?
While the Rs 9,000 crore promoter investment in Q1 brings a measure of reassurance, investors will still have to wait for Jio and retail to work through their challenges.
FY26 numbers show that Airtel is stealing a march on its larger rival on most counts and is unrelenting in its ambition, casting a cloud on Jio’s valuation.
