New Delhi: Bharti Airtel and Google on Friday announced a multi-year agreement to boost India's digital ecosystem, with Sundar Pichai-led tech giant investing $700 million to acquire 1.28 percent ownership in Airtel and up to $300 million toward commercial agreements. The $700 million equity investment in Bharti Airtel is at a price per share of Rs 734, while $300 million will go towards investments in scaling Airtel's offerings that cover a range of devices to consumers.
"With our future-ready network, digital platforms, last-mile distribution and payments ecosystem, we look forward to working closely with Google to increase the depth and breadth of India's digital ecosystem," said Sunil Bharti Mittal, Chairman of Bharti Airtel. This deal will be subject to necessary regulatory approvals. As a part of their first commercial agreement, Airtel and Google will work together to build on Airtel's extensive offerings that cover a range of Android-enabled devices to consumers via innovative affordability programmes.